The Sands of Solipsism
by Raving In The Rain
Summary: Tea, an aspiring ballerina, never had a solo until the company put on "The Sands of Solipsism". The role of Sekherta, the murderous Egyptian queen, is all she's ever dreamed of. But when her rival dancer mysteriously dies, Tea's dream becomes a nightmare; for whoever has the lead role is haunted by the sadistic queen's spirit who wants revenge on her ancient husband- Yami.
1. Act 1, Scene 1: A Calling

**Author's Note**

_This is sort of, but not really, a sequel to my other story "Of All The King's Wives," and there probably will be spoilers for it if you choose to read this one first. _

_But go ahead and get down with your bad self and read in any way you want. I don't judge... too much._

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><p><strong>SUMMARY<strong>

Tea is an aspiring ballet dancer. She's been doing it all her life, but has never been granted a solo or even a duet. That is, until some mysterious happenings surround her rival dancer, Angeline Everstone, while rehersing for the upcoming performance of "The Sands of Solipsism". Although Tea's never heard of it, there's a legend surrounding the ballet; that whomever has the leading role of Sekherta, the guile and murderous Ancient Egyptian Queen, is haunted by her spirit. Sekherta is known to be one of the hardest and most pressuring roles in all ballet to dance. But when an accident strikes the ballet company, Tea is forced to fill the role, unaware that the spirit of Sekherta is out for revenge against her ancient husband, a mysterious Pharaoh who once had seven beautiful wives, the same pharaoh that is Tea's friend/crush; Yami.

_There will be **PEACHSHIPPING** & some **Revolutionshipping**._

_I'm NOT a fan of revolutionshipping- firstly, Yami knows Yugi has a crush on Tea. Dating Tea would mean using Yugi's body to date Yugi's crush, and Yami- with all those honor and friendship speeches- would never do that. But in order for this fic to work out, I just have to suck it up._

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><p><span>Act I, Scene I<span>

Your toes are never pointed in the right direction. Your facials are never quite expressive enough, and even if they are adequate, they're never expressed at the appropriate times. Your jumps are never high enough. Your turns are too slow or the way you outstretch your arm is too quick, too stiff. Most wouldn't believe it, but ballet is probably one of the more difficult forms of dance. Yes, it looks graceful and all, but that's because we've sweat and we've cried and we've twisted our ankles enough times to make it look that way. Perfection is painful. And that's what we strive for; perfection. Or, at least, our understanding of it.

Apparently, my understanding of perfection is a lousy one. Madame Thibeault makes that crystal clear at almost every rehearsal. In fact, she wouldn't even allow me to try out for any of the main roles; not the killer queen, Sekherta, or the pharaoh's lover, Kemat; not even one of the many wives who eventually are slain like Neferme or Anahknemrure. Ever since I began ballet classes as a young girl, "_The Sands of Solipsism_" has always been one of my favorite ballets. I mean, I literally sit in my room and watch variations of the ballet like it's a canticle and I'm learning through catechism. I admire the story so much- the romance, the enlightening dread, the gracefulness in which fear and murder are portrayed. Even alongside my hip-hop, jazz, and electro classes, my passion has always been to dance the part of Sekherta; the murderous, misunderstood Queen of Egypt.

Most would want to be Kemat because she's the only ray of hope in all the story who fell in love with the pharaoh and yada-yada, all that good stuff. Not saying I don't like Kemat- _I do_- and I would gladly accept that part as well, but I have always been in rapt by the way the ballerinas who dance as Sekherta move! Even when they dance the murders. There's something just so surreal and true about the way they coruscate about the stage. And as disturbing as it is, they make insanity and murder almost look sensuous. You know, like, you want to _taste_ the sin. It's terrible! It's almost like they're not themselves on stage, but instead are laced in a dark euphoria left behind by Sekherta herself.

I craved the part even more when I met Yami. His opinion on dance of any kind was never made clear, but I'm sure he would at least appreciate the story of this ballet. It may even help him remember his past, if only just a little bit. He is our real Pharaoh, our beloved friend and Ancient Egyptian spirit. When I heard that we'd be performing _The Sands of Solipsism_, I spent every free moment I could learning both the parts of Sekherta and Kemat. I mean, I already knew them pretty well, but a little obsessive practice never hurt anyone. Ok, scratch that last part. I hoped and prayed that I'd get one of the parts for Yami.

I want to perform for him and maybe not all for the purpose of reintroducing him to life in Ancient Egypt. Maybe I want it more for his attention, for his eyes to be on me and _only_ me; to enchant him, I guess I could say. Ok, I know that sounds cliché, but it's just like picking out a cute outfit for a party or get-together. What other reason have you to do so if not to "enchant" a certain cutie?

And you'd think that because I already know those parts by heart that I'd actually get a main role. Nope. I'm pretty much set on the belief that Madame Thibeault hates my guts. That's why I was cast as Servant Girl # 3. In the background again, never a solo in the spotlight, never allowed to stand out from the rest. When we did _The Nutcracker_, I was always one of the flowers or snowflakes. _Cinderella_ and _The Sleeping Beauty_; I was just another ballroom dancer, and one time when I got lucky, I was a mouse. And _Giselle_- one of the most fought over roles for ballerinas worldwide- yeah, no. I didn't even get my hopes up for that one.

A few days ago, Madame Thibeault, my ballet instructor and manager of the company, revealed to us that we'd be performing it for the Winter Traditional. Almost everyone does _The Nutcracker _around this time of year, when really the Winter Traditional is all about showing off what you've been working on all season, perfecting your most difficult performances and putting your best dancers center stage for the audience and scouts to feast upon. Madame Thibeault understood that. So, instead of _La Bayadère_, _Coppélia_, or _Romeo & Juliet_, she chose one of the more rare and intimidating ballets.

But, of course, the lead role could never go to anyone who is as tardy as I am to rehearsals. Hey, it's only because I have a monstrous amount of homework, and I know for sure that I am far too tired after ballet classes to do be doing any calculus work. I'm still surprised that some of my fellow dancers aren't late because we have a lot of the same classes together at school. Especially Summer Woods.

Madame Thibeault has me stay late after practice. She says it's to catch up, but I know it's really a punishment. I do T-Kicks and wall-sits while she plays Charles Aznavour singing "La Boheme" on repeat. Summer, Hayden, and Angeline are staying after as well. As much as I admire them as dancers, and may even call Summer a friend at times, I can't help but despise them watching them practice the lead roles- _two of which should have been mine_! Summer is to be the beautiful Kemat, Hayden is Pharaoh, and Angeline is the graceful sinner Sekherta. _Ugh_!

"Très belle, très belle, Angeline." Madame Thibeault applauds. "Now, you are lost in yourself. Reach out for the world! You want to be saved! Yes, yes, Angeline! C'est bonne!"

I have to admit that Angeline is a talented dancer. Heck, she's the best in the company! She's been dancing "en pointe" since she was nine. She acts the part of Sekherta well-enough for just learning the variation a few days ago, but there's just something missing. Yeah, Angeline has the looks both in the way she dances and physically. She's fierce, she's confident, and I peg her as a total bully sometimes. But she doesn't dance like Svetlana Zakharova or Yuan Yuan Tan, or- _oh my gosh_- Fantasme Dvorzhetski; the greatest ballerinas to have ever danced as Sekherta. Or just the greatest ballerinas ever. They've always been my idols alongside Yugi and Yami, of course.

I'm not saying I can do a better job than Angeline, but at the same time, I really am.

I sweat my envy, watching as Angeline turns an astounding set of ten fouettes en pointe. Madame Thibeault bursts into a clapping frenzy as she usually does when she's proud. My wobbly and sore knees give in to frustration and my butt falls hard onto the floor.

"Tea? I didn't say you could stop. Five more minutes of wall sits. Maybe this will teach those scrawny legs of yours to walk faster so you can get here on time."

"Yes, Madame Thibeault." I roll my eyes. But her attention is quickly brought over to Summer instead of ensuring that I return to the sweat-imprinted wall. Angeline practices in front of the mirror while Madame Thibeault instructs Summer and Hayden through counts.

"And on three, a clean tour en l'air. Then from there," she guides Summer's arms gently, "I need you to give me a clean petite sissone starting from the fifth position. Remember, Pharaoh is your friend. You're greeting, you're fantasizing. Show me a romance blooming from this friendship."

It's terribly cruel to have to watch them learn the parts I love so very much. I can do those moves; the arabesques, the fouettes, even a graceful tour en seconde. I can perform as the Queen of Egypt, I can even be the servant Kemat and the object of Pharaoh's affections.

If only Madame Thibeault knew that it's not _just_ about the ballet.

I can be like my idols and leave an enthralled crowd excited and applauding for more. As Summer and Hayden are guided through the motions, I can see the dance in my mind just as it was performed in the height of the ballet's popularity. It was Josephine Pena, a young and fresh dancer who played Kemat, and Mathias Ebdel who danced the pharaoh. This is the part when she dances alone with Pharaoh in the throne room. They were falling in love behind closed doors, their arms entwining and their passion pulsing.

It's a 'Pas de Deux'. A partner dance.

My arms follow along with the music like it's an instinct. I close my eyes and it's me standing there beside Yami. He's dressed as a pharaoh should be, lathered in gold, and in the finest of tunics. I am Kemat, the servant of his fourth wife Sekherta. We are in the throne room when he lifts me into the air with such ease. I feel free, beloved. We almost forget about the steps to the dance it just feels so natural. Although the surrounding Egyptian palace looks more like an artistic stage setting than the real deal, it doesn't make it any less satisfying to me. The motions are flowing. My body knows how to move before I can even register what it's doing.

There is a terrible scream that forces my eyes to open immediately. I am torn from my splendorous vision and the majesty of the gentle piano when Angeline clamorously stumbles from the mirror. Her breath is short and panicky like she's just seen a ghost.

"Angeline? Are you alright?" we all come to her aid.

"What's the matter?"

"I…I…." she begins to stand. "It's nothing. I must have just been seeing things, that's all. I _have_ been pretty tired lately, staying after so late and all."

"What do you mean?"

"For a moment there… I felt like I was floating. I swear I was in a room full of people. I could almost hear the crowd chatting and smell something like a sweet burning scent, and some _serious_ BO. But I wanted to scream, to cry even. And the next thing I know, I'm looking back at myself in the mirror, midway through a turn, and there are these black, raccoon eyes staring into my reflection from right over my shoulder. It was so strange. Like I wasn't there…but I know I was."

"Raccoon eyes? Like the Ancient Egyptians wore?"

"Y-yeah. Just like that, actually."

"Oh, don't be silly, Angeline. You're probably just so into your role that you imagined yourself as Sekherta. Don't be frightened, dear, it's only your brilliant mind becoming one with the dance."

"And like you said," Hayden smiles at his partner, "you've been working pretty hard lately. It's ok. Ever since getting the role of Pharaoh, sometimes I completely convince myself that there are actually little servant people there to do my homework for me."

"I don't think that's quite the same thing." I laugh.

"Thanks, you guys. You're probably right."

I smirk, wanting to laugh. Her brilliant mind is imagining herself to be Sekherta? Just what kind of stunt is she trying to pull? _She's been working really hard_? If anything, I bet she's trying to get Madame Thibeault to ease up on her- if it's possible to ease up any more. Madame Thibeault must sense my amusement in the matter and she shoots a strict glare at me. Her green eyes may not be ones for vision, but they can tear right through your soul. If one of her looks isn't enough to straighten you up, then that is a pretty impressive durability. I've seen _Joey_ turned into an obedient little puppy under one of her glares!

"You all may leave. You've worked very hard today and I am proud."

"Thank you." said Summer, Hayden and Angeline. I'm about to untie my shoes when Madame Thibeault snaps at me.

"Not you, Tea. You still owe me twenty more T-kicks both left and right."

"What?"

"Bye, Tea." Angeline waves mockingly.

"Ugh." I somehow manage to stand up and swing up my legs for T-kicks.

* * *

><p>I have to change quickly when I get home. I'm supposed to meet up with Yugi, Joey, and Tristan at the movies tonight. I've been promising them we can all hang out soon, just like we used to in the old days, but recently I have just been so busy. I had to keep blowing them off and every time I promised myself that it wouldn't happen again. Tonight I am determined to keep my promise. Besides, after all the stress of keeping my grades up, all my dance classes, and the job that I technically am not allowed to have until I graduate, I think I deserve a little break.<p>

I miss my friends. I still see them at school, but it just isn't the same. We hardly ever hang out anymore, and I can honestly say that, for the most part, it's my fault.

My legs ache terribly, but I finally manage to slip into my favorite magenta leggings and brown faux-hiking boots. A car horn sings like a tenor just outside my bedroom window. Pulling away the girly curtains of my room, Joey and Tristan are waving at me with their goofy grins.

"Tea, your friends are here!" my mom calls.

"I know! I'll be down in a sec!"

I grab my denim jacket, clip the last of my accessories, and begin running out of my room when I am stopped by a laugh. A reverberating, almost malignant, and hardly noticeable chortle swings around the room. It's enough to capture my attention. I stand in the threshold for just a moment longer and then flick off my bedroom light. Maybe I'd hear it again as I scan around my room, in each corner, over the desk and on the bed. But there is nothing. So I shrug it off, turning back towards the hall and leave.

Tristan is the only one who can actually drive- _legally_, that is. While Joey does so illegally and Yugi just barely has his permit, I am the only one without a clue about driving. I sit in the back with Yugi in Tristan's Mercedes CLS. He likes to think he's quite the hot-shot when he's behind the wheel, even though we all know his father is just letting him borrow it. Tristan's _real _car is a broken down old pick-up.

"What took you so long, Tea?" Joey spins around in the front seat.

"Are you _really_ sure _you _of all people should be complaining about others being late?"

"I'm never late, I'm just not a time."

Yugi and I share a look.

"Um, Joey, wouldn't that mean that you're still just…late?" Yugi, of course, tries to be gentle about the situation.

"Um…regardless! That still leaves my question unanswered, Tea."

"Oh, well, sorry guys. Ugh, my legs are just so sore, I guess it's really slowing me down. Madame Thibeault must have a grudge against me or something."

"What, that cranky, old ballet lady?"

"That's her alright."

"Yikes. I don't know why you even put up with her. I mean, come on, it's just _ballet_. What kind of training do you need to do that girly twirling and stuff?"

"It's not _just_ ballet!" sometimes, I have to admit, Joey really gets on my last nerve. I know he doesn't mean to, and I still love him like a brother, but man he can be so insensitive sometimes.

"Ballet is an art, a story telling using only the enrapturing powers of the body. It's like poetry on the tips of your toes, or singing with your eyes, painting with slightest bend of the wrist. It takes a lot of hard work, endurance, and skill to dance ballet- especially with pointe shoes. Let's be honest, dancing on your toes is not natural. Serious deformations can come from ballet, I'll have you know. The only reason it looks so easy is because we've dedicated ourselves to getting it to that point. But, then again, what would _you _know about art?"

"Hey! What's that supposed to mean?"

"Actually," Yugi cuts in, "I think ballet is a very interesting way to tell a story. I mean, if you think about it, ballerinas are believed to be these elegant, innocent dancers, when in truth they are telling some of the most doleful, twisted tales. I think it takes an immense talent to portray all that _and _do so gracefully."

"Oh, don't tell me you're getting all sensitive too, Yugi. Men don't go to the ballet." Tristan shakes his head.

"Ignore them, Tea." Yugi smiles at me with his charming, violet eyes. "I know you work really hard learning all those dances, even with a strict teacher. I'd love to go to one of your shows one day. I'm sure you'll do great."

"I was hoping you'd say something like that."

"Hunh?"

"See, we're performing 'The Sands of Solipsism' for this year's Winter Traditional. It would mean a lot to me if you came to watch. That includes you, Joey and Tristan."

"But we're manly men. We don't go to the-"

"You're coming to the ballet!" I launch myself at Joey and pull at his ear.

"Alright, alright! Cool it, we'll go!"

I smirk victoriously when Yugi offers a small laugh.

"Stupid ballet…" Joey grumbles, slumping down into the leather of the seat.

"Forgive me, Tea, but what exactly _is_ 'The Sands of Solipsism'?"

"Hm? Oh. Well, it's a tragic story that I think may help Yami remember some things about his past. It takes place in Ancient Egypt, during the reign of a pharaoh that historians simply can't put a name _or _a face to. It's supposed to be based on a true story told through hieroglyphics found somewhere buried in an unmarked tomb. This pharaoh had seven beautiful wives, all who were skilled in some manner or another, but they all fought with each other to become the Queen of Egypt. See, the pharaoh could only select one, but he just couldn't decide. One of his wives, a maligant seductress named Sekherta, takes it upon herself to enchant the pharaoh and make him choose her as queen. But little does she know, the pharaoh is actually in love with her own personal servant, her light-spirited handmaiden named Kemat.

Of course, Sekherta soon finds out and simply can't bear the disgrace in that. She does whatever she can to keep Kemat away from the pharaoh, sometimes beats her and bloodies her in the hopes that she won't be beautiful in the eyes of the pharaoh anymore. But Sekherta has a secret as well; her father, a nobleman named Harantatef, is the force driving darkness and fear into her all her life. Sekherta tries to win her father's affections and approval by ensuring the throne for herself, so she makes it her mission to kill all the pharaoh's other wives! But, in the process, she loses herself to the darkness and all that remained of her sanity is destroyed. Still, Kemat and the pharaoh meet in secret, each time falling deeper and deeper in love."

"How does it end?"

"Well, I don't want to give it all away. But let's just say that true love can be bloody, but never interred."

"Oh. Do you think the pharaoh in the story is the spirit of my Millennium Puzzle?"

"It could be. No one can name the pharaoh who is spoken of in the hieroglyphics from where the story was found. You never know. I'm certainly open to the possibility."

"Me too." Yugi nods. "I think that Yami will enjoy this ballet. It sounds very interesting."

"Great. I can cop you all free, if not lower priced tickets as soon as I can."

"Thanks, Tea!"

The theatre is almost filled when we arrive. Joey and Tristan are more than excited to see the film which they just had to get the midnight premier tickets for. It's a horror film, which I make sure to sit next to Yugi for. I know I'll be scared half way into the movie. I never had the stomach or the nerves for such things. It's called "Duel", about some duelist who goes around killing his opponents and turning them into duel monsters. The horrifying thing is that how they look when they die is how they'll look on the cards. I grip Yugi's hand whenever I am scared. Pathetic, I know. But, there are certain moments during the film when I think it is Yami's hand I am holding. Maybe Yugi is scared too and that's why. Either way, it's more than comforting to have them at my side.

Although _The Sands of Solipsism _is terrifying in its own elegant way, I don't think I'm as frightened by it as I am by this movie because there is no blood in ballet.

Or, at least, there shouldn't be.

* * *

><p><strong>I understand most of you are not ballerinas and may not even be interested in ballet. That's cool. Therefore, we also understand that there will be some things in this story like a 'tour en seconde' and 'fouettes' that you may not comprehend. Don't worry. We will try do our best and explain later. Do keep in mind that youtube is also a good reference.<strong>


	2. Act 1, Scene 2: It Begins

Act I, Scene II

"Someone find her!" Madame Thibeault howls. She takes out her silver bun, gives her hair a thorough roughing, and ties it all up again. Her already wrinkled face has lakes of reds and worry rashes. All we can do is watch her pace about the studio, peering over everyone's shoulder to see if they've received a reply text or call. She is like a vengeful hawk whose precious egg had been stolen. Her precious egg being Angeline. She hasn't showed up to rehearsal yet- no, wait, the _protagonist_ hasn't shown up.

I sit with Summer and Yugi, who I made come along with me, at the side of the room where Madame Thibeault's rage scarcely scathes. Summer and I down the last of our water bottles. We've been warming up for so long that I feel like I can't stretch or point any more. Even the pianist has stopped playing to un-cramp his fingers. The studio is littered with leg warmers and shrugs, pointe shoes and water bottles. Summer and I only add to the clutter, and all we can do is sit around and wait while Madame Thibeault snaps at someone- _anyone_- to find out where Angeline is.

"How long do you think she'll wait for her to show up so we can move on with rehearsal?" I whisper along to Summer.

"Not much longer. See how red she is?"

"Yeah," Hayden comes to sit with us, "I think she might burst. You know, like one of those deep sea creatures that science people try to bring up to the surface? Kaplow!"

"Thank you for that eloquent description, Hayden." Summer rolls her eyes.

"How poetic." I add, and then turn to Yugi. He's his usual reserved self, sitting patiently next to me with our backs against the wall. He shuffles and sorts his duel deck like he's planning moves he's yet to try. I give a little nudge with my elbow and smile when he looks back.

"Sorry I dragged you here, Yugi. You must be so bored."

"It's alright, Tea. We don't mind at all. It's nice to take a break from dueling sometimes. And besides, we get to watch you do what you love."

"A break from dueling? Well, you're doing a superb job of that." I swipe his monster reborn card from his hand and use it to fan myself dramatically. "Maybe one day there'll be a ballet all about Duel Monsters. I can see it now; Domino City Productions is proud to present _Heart of the Cards_, an extravagant new ballet of the most beloved card game man has ever known. The tragedy, the romance, the music! And, of course, starring Tea Gardner as the beautiful Dark Magician Girl."

We burst out laughing. There are a few glares heading our way from across the studio, but it doesn't faze us in the least. I feel us getting closer; Yugi and I. Our heads lean in towards each other, bouncing with our chuckles, and our shoulders gently collide.

"Where is she?" Madame Thibeault screeches like Mai's Harpie Ladies. Her voice cuts right through the laughter, right down to our shoulders and splits us part. And so we quickly pull away and stiffen as if called to attention. Yugi and I still want to laugh.

"So, who exactly is missing?" he asks.

"Angeline. She… she has the lead role. I'm just Servant Girl #3."

"Oh." he looks down. "I'm sorry."

"It's ok. Really. I don't mind. As long as I'm dancing, that's all that matters." I try to smile. I can't even pretend he's oblivious to my disappointment. He sees how much I wish I mean what I say, but to my credit, he says nothing more about it.

"Alright," the old ballet instructor sighs, calling everyone's attention. "We'll have to start without her. We have too much work to do to be sitting around. Everyone up."

"But, Madame Thibeault, that's not really fair. Everyone else can practice just fine, but what about Summer and I?" Hayden stands.

"Yeah. I mean, we pretty much know our solos. What we really need to work on are the pas des deux and trois which require Angeline."

Madame Thibeault pinches the bridge of her nose. She curses something inaudible, and probably in French. There is an immediate rush of excitement and hope surging through my veins. No one has so much as looked at me with the suggestion that I could fill in for Angeline, but my cheeks are already rosying. I'm pleading so very softly in my head, with hope pounding in every heartbeat, that someone notices me. _Think of me_! I want to scream it, take the initiative myself and show Madame Thibeault just how well I can dance the role of Sekherta.

But I fail. I lack the audacity that makes Sekherta the character she is, the boldness that makes her role so hard to dance. Just because I know the steps doesn't mean I can fill her pointe shoes. And now I know why Madame Thibeault never picks me for a solo. I'm not ready for the spotlight. I'm not Angeline.

Yugi sees me falter and the opportunity slipping perfectly away. I do everything in my power not to look at him. All those times I've cheered him on, duel after duel, and somehow I managed to con myself along the way, pretending I follow my own advice. When really I am crushed below my own words and motivation.

"Excuse me," Yugi's voice reaches above everyone's and I think it's more because I always listen for that voice when I am down, "but might I suggest having Tea fill in for Angeline? She knows almost every part by heart. I've seen her do it. Even _if_ it's just for a day."

His natural obsequious friendship has again come to my aid. There is hope in his words. It's like he can see into me and lift the spirit I haven't realized fell. The _if _part is what hooks my heart the most. How he manages to hold up faith that Madame Thibeault will allow me to have a solo (or at least a spot in a pas des quatres) is astounding. His violet eyes meet my blue ones and there is only bliss there, only all the "thank you"s that need be given.

"Mademoiselle Gardner? Impossible." she scoffs.

"No, wait." Summer steps forward. "That's actually a really good idea. Tea was the one who actually helped me with my solos. Please, Madame Thibeault, just so we can practice at least? She knows like every part. Hayden and I need all the practice we can get. We don't want a repeat of last year's _Don Quixote_, do we?"

"Ehhh." Hayden shudders. "I think I still have the bruise from that ballet's mishaps."

"S'il vous plait?" I stand. Using her native language is the most earnest way of pleading I can think of. Because, yes, I have indeed resorted to pleading. "I know the role of Sekherta like I know my ABCs. I can do this."

"Ah, oui. Just for today." the wrinkles along her face ease as she waves us off. "What are you all staring at? Get to work!"

Summer immediately grabs my hands and leaps in excitement. She pulls me and Hayden over toward her favorite practicing spot; the open wood space in front of the mirrors and clear of the barre practice. I look back to see Yugi standing with a smile so big he has to close his eyes. He gives me that good old thumbs up, the epitome of his pride and promises that somehow brings out the best in everyone he shows it to.

"Ok," Hayden takes a ready stance, "Let's work on the dream variation. Just the sequence between Sekherta, Pharaoh, and Kemat. We can skip over the jump work when the character Harantatef enters and just continue on with the lifts and acting."

"Great idea." I nod. Yugi's monster reborn card is still wedged between my fingers and it's only now that I realize this. Summer and Hayden are already taking their positions and so I slip it into the trim of my leotard where it should be pretty well protected. Or so I hope. A fellow dancer in the corps de ballet, the place where I belong, is kind enough to turn on the small stereo on the shelf across. It's the recording from the 1943 performance that plays. The music climbs up and down the discords of the infant technology and through the eerie haze.

Still, the three of us dancers continue on through the mist of music. We wind around another, pulled by the strings of the violins and shoved by the ominous cellos. It is the famous dream sequence from the ballet, when Sekherta falls into her ever darkening nightmares that tell her to kill Pharaoh's wives. She dreams of her handmaiden Kemat and her husband the pharaoh, being the polarities that divide her loyalty. Well, the scarce amount that she has. Her father, Harantatef, as well as her first few victims float in and out of the dream and try to toss her at her guilt and mistakes. Sekherta loses herself here. She becomes her own enemy, a body without a being.

And I am finally dancing her role for others to see.

Hayden holds me firmly at my waist, turning me about as I stand on the point of my shoes and lift a leg over his shoulder. Summer twirls around us as light and as pure as Kemat ought to be. She reaches for my hand as I point it outwards, but "Pharaoh" keeps turning me away.

Madame Thibeault watches us from afar. In the brevity of the moments I can find an image of her between spins, her snaked neck is stretched high above the heads of the other dancers and her vilipending eyes follow my every move like magnets. Yugi watches us too. I see he has put away all his cards and is now eyeing me especially. In all honesty, I'm not entirely conscious of my body. It moves without a thought, only emulating the ballerinas I've watched on the internet and ties itself to the music notes tightly around me.

I pull away from Hayden, or, "Pharaoh" rather. Kemat is there to take me into her arms. She is the purity Sekherta wants to enthrall herself in. The soon-to-be queen of Egypt wants to be the servant. And I make sure to print this story upon my countenance and all down my arms.

"Leave me alone!" this agonized plea sprouts out of the static coming from the stereo. It sounds so familiar. It sounds like-

"Angeline?"

We stop dancing. The music continues on over the sounds of struggles somewhere deep in the recording. Hayden, Summer, and I all look at each other as if to confirm that we're all hearing the exact same thing. Running footsteps are hidden in the rumbles of a timpani, and what sounds like a patronizing chortles blend with the flutes. But we can all still hear it through its musical mask until Summer rushes to pause it.

"Why did you all stop? Go, go. Play the music again. Continue. I wish to see more of this." Madame Thibeault come over and gives us pushing motions with her vein carved hands.

"Sorry, Madame. It's just… the music sounded strange to us." I try.

"It is an old recording. What do you expect? Now, continue. And Hayden, extend your arms this time. When you lift her, push up with your legs. You'll hurt your back if you don't. And Summer, this is the dream sequence- so flow! Flow dreamily across the stage as you did for your 'Dying Swan' act in _Swan Lake_. You've lost that elegance and I want it back. And, Tea,"

She hesitates. I see the sparks in her eyes like she's sharpening a blade with them, and I prepare for the worst. She probably has a barrage of degrading critiques, from the most miniscule nothings to the actual, obvious mistakes.

"No smiling."

But a smile comes to me anyways. I mean, that's it? No scolding? No finger wagging? No insults?

I nod my head, surprised and yet so proud to see how intrigued she is with just a few minutes of watching me dance. I take my position at Summer's side again, extending an arm to greet the orchestra I'm imagining is waiting for that signal to begin. Madame Thibeault goes for the stereo, and as I suck in a concentrated breath, thunderous screams of static fly from the speakers. Everyone in the studio in stunned by the macabre ringing noise that ensues. It feels like someone has strung wired chords through our ears and saws them deep into the flesh that throbs there.

We're all screaming that someone turn the noise off, but no matter which button Madame Thibeault slams, the sound does not die. The next thing I know, Hayden is pushing past me and yelling something he probably wouldn't say if there was a chance anyone could hear. He struggles with our ballet instructor for the stereo, pounding on every button he can find. Madame Thibeault is hesitant to let him have it, seeing as his arms are held high and ready to chuck the thing across the room.

And then it stops. It stops just before Hayden can get it out of his hands, and just as a door slam hardens the new silence. All I see is a pack of bun-heads all lifting their heads towards the door. Hayden, Summer, and I follow Madame Thibeault around the corner where I meet hands with Yugi. I pull him close for… well, I actually don't know why. I just do it.

"I thought this was ballet rehearsal, not a heavy metal concert." Angeline taunts as she tosses her dance bag to the floor. She begins unzipping her jacket and pulling off her sweats to her leggings beneath as though oblivious. When she catches on to how quietly we are all spying her, she only stops to look up at us, rolls her eyes, and says; "What are you all staring at? I know I'm late, but gosh, the best dancer is here now. You can stop giving me those freaky looks."

Heads are scratched and eyes are turned as we all pretend Angeline isn't such a prima-donna and that the noise that had suddenly stopped at her arrival never happened. Sluggishly, I am ready to return to the corps de ballet, the majority of the dancers in the company who don't have solos or any real meaningful role. Now that Angeline is finally here, Madame Thibeault will surely have me return to practicing my sideline poses and group work. The excitement of dancing my favorite role in all ballet, the role that clearly is out of my character, is short lived. Now I must go back to being another tutu in a grand, swirling swarm of tutus.

Just as I step away, Madame Thibeault has her hand around my wrist. I think I am just as shocked by this move as Angeline is. She tells her to finish warming up and pulls me back to the more secluded area where she has me stand alone in front of her, Summer, Hayden, and Yugi.

"Dance. I want you to dance the introduction solo of Sekherta. Now, with emotion." she reaches for the stereo, the rest of us half expecting for that shrill to come ravaging through our ears again. Only music flows out, however, and I am left standing in the aim of all these eyes. I hear the haunting melody begin; Sekherta's doleful, cynical theme song. And, might I mention, one of the most difficult sequences in the entire ballet! It is here in this melody, the one that has itself eagerly introduced in just the first two acts of the ballet, that we first gain a glimpse of the darkness inside Sekherta. I move along to her hurt, kick up my legs, and twirl in all her torment.

When I turn back around to face my audience, I see it has doubled in size. Some of the girls who were selected to play Pharaoh's wives have come to watch, and even a few of the younger dancers have seated themselves in rows before me. But, above all, I notice Yami there standing, his eyes unwavering as I dance the role of a pharaoh's wife- perhaps even one of _his _ancient wives. Yugi has swapped places with him in the secrecy of the Millennium Puzzle that weights his neck. My heart beats over the sickly cellos and stumbles over the morbid violins. Now is not the time to be choking on breath, but there is one holding at the sides of my throat, refusing to come out. My face heats childishly and I fear that he notices it.

_Please don't let him suspect anything_! _How embarrassing_!

But there is something more. I don't notice it right away, but the further into the song I dance, the more I can feel this force seeping around me. It seems that there are none else who are moved by it as I am- none, at least, but Angeline. It's in her eyes, whatever it is. Something is there. A stinging arouses from inside me, sending all the wrong sorts of jitters into the nooks and crannies of my being. This uneasiness around me whispers within the music as it slakes emptily. Angeline feels it to. She backs away into a corner, shaking her head and clearly wishing she hadn't come here.

But the feeling fades. It moves away, somewhere I can't see or feel anymore, because the music has ended. Yami is again Yugi and an applause is there waiting for my return to reality.

"That was beautiful. Such grace!" I hear some girls shout out. Summer and Hayden are the first ones to come running up to me. They're smiling about something, my performance I believe, but I can't quite make out any of their words. I only see Angeline through the bobbling heads of the other dancers. She squints her eyes painfully, and I can imagine her making a hissing noise of some sort with the face she's made. No one is looking at her but me, and so she feels free to say something she knows no one will hear. But I can tell it is nothing friendly, and not just because she usually tends to be that way.

Madame Thibeault's face eases. She nods her head, gives me an approving smile, and returns to pretending she doesn't recognize my talent. But I know, at least by the gleam in her old, tired eyes, that she's just appointed me to be Angeline's alternate.

_Success!_

"Angeline," she calls, "are you done? Come, I would like for you to work on the formations and steps of the coronation sequence with all of Pharaoh's wives. Julie? Lydia? Come on, girls."

"Of course." Angeline tries to appear resolute. She passes by me in what I feel to be an impasse of time. For a moment, it is her and I just standing shoulder to shoulder, and her gaze burning into me like a brand of property. She has me trapped, surrounded on all sides it seems, by a force I can't totally believe is hers alone. It is only when Yugi's hand reaches my arm in a congratulatory hold that I awake from this spontaneous spite.

"That was really good, Tea. The other me thinks so too." he smiles.

"Thanks, Yugi. And you too, Pharaoh." my words come with a small laugh as though I had always wanted to have them say that. "Oh! I almost forgot!"

I reach into the slits of my leotard and pull out Monster Reborn.

"I hope it's not too bent."

"It's fine. So long as you didn't cheat and use it to bring Sekherta back to life just so it would help you dance her part better!" he winks.

"Oh, no, no, no." I shake my head playfully. "I wouldn't want to do that. That could be dangerous."

We take a look behind us. Angeline, or so I like to believe, is her usual self. But I can't convince myself completely. I guess the reason she has this part and not me is because of her talent for acting. She acts as though nothing is wrong, as though she hadn't felt what I felt earlier. She is center stage, exerting her dominance at the point of the triangle formation all seven of the dancing wives form. What she lacked only two days ago is now present in every move she makes, every jump she leaps and fouette she spins. All the sudden I see her as what I was sure she couldn't be. She's like one of the dancers I watch intently on the internet; like Fantasme Dvorzhetski, Svetlana Zakharova, or Josephine Pena. She dances like a real Sekherta. She dances like her heart is broken.

**End Chapter**

* * *

><p><strong>Pas de deux  trois / quatre - **(Step of two / three / four) Really, this is the French way of saying a sequenced dance between two, three, or however many people. Usually you'll see 'pas de deux', which is mainly a dance between a man and a woman. This can be applied to basically any form of dance, not just ballet. They are very hard, of course, because most require complete synchronization (and ballet itself is very difficult, believe it or not). The best example I can give of a pas de quatre (dance of four), is a very famous act from Swan Lake; Act 2, Pas De Quatre (I recommend Youtube).

**Corps de ballet** - (The body of the ballet) Again, those French terms. Simply, this is the majority of the dancers in a ballet who perform most of the transition dances and add the effects to the soloists by standing off to the side and changing poses. If you watch any ballet, you will see rows of them standing at both ends of the stage, or even sitting off in the background as bystanders and extras to add a more realistic, artistic, magickal, or regal effect.

**Pointe shoes** - I'm pretty sure this one is self-explanatory, but just in case, these are the first (or second) things you imagine when you think of ballerinas. Pointe shoes are different than simple ballet slippers because of the wooden or tissued box that is placed at the toe. Ballet dancers will not use these types of shoes until they've trained long enough to be ready; meaning they have to have good foot arches, they can not sickle their ankles, they need good balance, and other requirements I don't feel like listing. Also, pointe shoes usually aren't worn until a certain age (12-16 depending on who and where they're working) to avoid serious injuries and foot deformations.


	3. Act 1, Scene 3: The Bully's Curse

Act I, Scene III

I have never been bullied. In all my life, not once has someone ever shoved me into a locker, slung insults at me without joking, purposely knocked my books from my hands, beat (or threatened to) me up after school, or tricked me with only the goal to embarrass me. No one's ever tried to bully me either. I'm kind of just… there, if you know what I mean. It's not that everyone likes me, but more that I'm just not a threat nor very entertaining if one _was _to pick on me. Or, perhaps because they know Joey and Tristan are two of my best pals. I know people who have been bullied, though- _lots_, in fact. Yugi, the closest friend I have, used to be bullied almost everyday; the poor guy. I mean, it's not as common now that he's the King of Games and all, but me? No. Never.

So when Angeline has my shoulders in her quick grips and my head is smacking against the lockers, I'm completely stunned. She has me up against the wall and it's just us two. I only left class for a bathroom break and she must have followed me or something because she's on me like a wolf.

"I'm tired of this little game of yours, Tea!" she growls. Her face is so close to mine that I am afraid to move, to exhale the gasp I had sucked in when my head was flung into the metal. Her satin green eyes devour my every move. It's not natural, like all this aggressiveness is satiated by a fear of a sort.

"Game? But, Angeline, what game? I don't under-"

"Shut up!" - she pulls me from the lockers only to give me another shove back into them- "I know you want my role, Tea. That's why you sent that Egyptian girl to make me late for practice; so while I was being tormented by that lunatic, you could dance my role in front of everyone in an attempt to steal it! Now Madame Thibeault has made you my alternate?"

"What? Are you out of your mind, Angeline? I have no idea what you're talking about. What Egyptian lady?"

"Ugh, I swear, Tea! I know it's hard for you, but you better stop playing dumb with me. Or so help me, you will never step foot in another dance studio again when I'm done with you!"

"I haven't done anything! I swear on my life!"

"You think you can fool me like everyone else with that innocent act of yours? There's no way anyone can that sweet and gentle. Of course no one would expect such a jerk move from someone like you. No; _you're so innocent and cute, always believing in the power of friendship and filling everyone's heads with dreams, and rainbows, and unicorns_." she taunts me with a lisp and a high pitch voice. "Well I won't be won by that, miss-pretty-little-princess! Do you honestly think I believe in the curse of 'The Sands of Solipsism'?"

"Hunh? The curse…?"

"Yeah; that whoever has the lead role of Sekherta is haunted by her ghost and yada-yada. Well, in case you haven't noticed, I'm a little too old to be believing in ghost stories, miss Gardner. So if you think you can scare me out of the ballet with this phony ghost of yours, you are _dead_ wrong."

"Angeline, I'm sorry someone has been playing tricks on you, but I swear to you that it's not me. I don't deny wanting to play Sekherta, but cheating just isn't something I do. Please, Angeline-"

"Ugh! Enough with this innocence! You think you're so good, don't you? Look, I know it was you. Who else would be able to pull off such a convincing Ancient Egyptian? You know, with the way you and your friends are always parading around with your history books and don't think I can't hear you all talking about the Egyptian exhibits at the museum all the time. More importantly, this little actress of yours came into my room like the creep she is and said your name, as well as that Yugi Muto kid's. And now you've just so happened to be made my alternate because that girl made me late?"

I am frightened by the slurring of her words. I want to say there is alcohol in her breath, but the smog of her perfume forbids me from being so bold. She's still a querulous, stuck up bully, but there's something more brute than usual in her tone of voice. And I can't help but wonder if it's the role. I mean, is ballet truly all that important to her? Can trying to dance the role of Sekherta really be this pressuring?

"Every main role has to have an alternate, just in case-"

"Just in case the chosen dancer is hurt, like that girl tried to do to me? Well, why didn't Madame Thibeault assign an alternate for Summer when she got the lead roles of Odette and Odile in 'Swan Lake'? Why didn't she assign an alternate for Hayden when he played the Nutcracker, or Romeo in 'Romeo & Juliet'?"

"I don't know!" I shout for all the empty hallway to hear. "Leave me alone, Angeline. I have done nothing to you!"

The bell rings. I never thought the day would come when I could say it, but I am saved by the bell. The school day is over and all the students come pouring out of the classrooms. I think Angeline will let me go since now there are all these witnesses, but to my surprise, she keeps me pinned. If anything, she only digs her nails in further. We get a few looks, and most of them fortressed by snickers and sneers. Yet no one dares step in. I'm about to get the daylights beat out of me and no one wants to stop- in fact, they probably want to watch this go down. It feels like it'd be more enjoyable since no one's ever seen this match-up before and they want to know if I squeal or if I swing.

_Angeline Everstone VS Tea Gardner_. Who would have ever thought, eh?

"Hey, is there a problem here?" Joey comes up to us. Can't believe I'm saying this, but: _Thank heavens Joey is here_!

Angeline's eyes snake over to him. Her look is solid and venomous, a look I didn't think her girly, materialistic self could pull off. Tristan and Yugi are running on to the scene, tunneling their way through the wild herd of finally-free students. And then Angeline's grip is so tenderly abated. It's so peculiar, so distant and uncoordinated. Ok, of course I'm glad her brightly polished nails around out of my shoulders, but I'm just so fascinated by how much I've much misjudged this girl before me. Maybe I never knew her, and it's only now that her colors are shining like the ones on her pampered fingernails.

But maybe I'm wrong.

The only reason she has let go is because something else has captured her heavy attention. Joey and I trace her gaze outward and down. _Yugi_? No, even more south than him. I'm almost positive it's the Millennium Puzzle glinting over Yugi's abdomen that has Angeline so dazzled. Her expression has lost all potency. Instead, it is a portrait of what I can only paint as the look a mad scientist might have when he accidentally stumbles upon the perfect ingredient. And she stares- _just like that_- without a care of how she looks, if her lip-gloss needs retouching, or if her hair is in its proper place. Yugi's only reply is to look at everything _but_ Angeline, with a touch of pink branching from his nose to his cheeks.

"Hey! I was talking to you!" Joey leaps in front of her, his arms waving like a defensive turkey.

"And I _wasn't_ talking to _you_." she hissed her annunciations. Angeline's hair slaps him across the face as she spins back to me. Her face is immediately so very near to mine and all I can do is back into the lockers until there is no more space between my back and the combination locks.

_This is it_! _Oh my gosh, she's about to punch me in the face_! _Please don't let this be as dramatic or as painful as it seems in the movies_!

"I'm not leaving the ballet, and that role is mine. You got it? _I'm_ Sekherta, and if you ever try again to take my place, those pretty ribbons on your pointe shoes are going to be around your neck."

Her fist crashes against the locker nearest my head. My body does exactly what I don't want it to and jolts at the sound. A small cry is heard from my mouth, although I deny my lips to set it free by parting.

"You leave her alone!" demands Yugi.

"Get away from her!" Tristan looks like he's about to pry her out of my face.

"Don't you dare touch me!" she snarls in a voice I'm not so sure is her own. It's too abysmal to be hers, or so I think I'm hearing. But I can't be. She's incredibly stressed, I'm incredibly shocked; anything can be misconstrued in that mess. Angeline says no more for me to decipher and leaves amongst the crowd.

"Tea!" Yugi is the first one to grab hold of me, almost ungluing me from the wall. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I mean, what was that all about?" Tristan takes my other hand.

"I'm fine, I'm fine." my head shakes in an attempt to tell my brain it's time to stop whining and get with the program. "Angeline and I just had a little misunderstanding, that's all. She's really under a lot of pressure right now. I mean, the opening performance of 'The Sands of Solipsism' is only two weeks away and still there is so much work to be done. Trust me, it's alright."

"So why was she all in your face about stealing her role?"

I cringe when Joey says it's _her_ role. It's not! Ok, so maybe Angeline is acting like a _real_ Sekherta nowadays with her creepy looks and violent confrontations and eerie attention span and…you know what, let me just stop right here. Still, it's not the same as the other dancers who had her role.

"She was late to rehearsal yesterday and, well, our instructor had me step in so the others could practice. And she thinks I planned it all by getting one of our friends to dress up as the ghost of Sekherta and creep her out."

"The ghost of _who_?"

"Sekherta, the main character in 'The Sands of Solipsism'. She's the Egyptian queen that murdered the pharaoh's wives. Apparently whoever has her role is haunted by her spirit."

They all look at each other and then back at me, each with a quizzical brow.

"I've heard of ancient curses, medallion curses, sorcerer curses, and even duel monster curses… but a ballet curse?" Joey stifles a laugh.

"I know it sounds strange. This is the first I've heard of it too. Look, all I know is that someone is messing around with Angeline and the joke's gone a little too far. I've never really liked the girl, but something has her spooked. I'm betting that whatever is going on, it's gotten violent."

"We can't let this keep happening." Yugi says firmly. "If she truly believes that you're the one doing this, Tea, things may escalate between the two of you. I don't want to think about it, but she could end up seriously hurting you. I think we were close to seeing that happen here today."

"Yugi's right. We have to do something."

But I don't want to think about it anymore. Angeline is right in one way; that no one is so innocent and good as I sometimes pretend to be, because I don't want anything to do with her now. Actually, if something were to happen to her, I don't think I'd mind. It'd be better for me- _for everyone!_-if she just disappeared. I could dance as Sekherta instead of her. I could bow at the end of a performance where people would stand and cheer my name, maybe even throw roses if I'm fortunate. And the ballet company will praise me for years to come, select me as a main role for every ballet that should follow. Angeline is the only thing preventing that now. _She's just in the way_!

Yugi, Joey, and Tristan are all still talking, pumping each other up with all these righteous speeches and protective gestures over me. But I'm not paying anymore attention really. My gaze is somewhere along the hallway that is as vacant as it was when I'd been pinned against the lockers. I look down at the doors, trying to peer out through the wired windows. I'm alone for some reason. I have my dearest friends right here beside me, but I am alone. Somewhere, I am just a bright pink pigment amongst the grimly green haze of this hallway. Slowly and steadily, the voices of my friends become only deep undertones in the approaching ringing sound. The noise squeals like the shriek that came from the stereo yesterday, and I am forced to cover my ears.

There are words in the constantly flowing screech. But I can understand none of them. I don't know if it's because they are so deeply engraved into the shrill sound, or if it's a language I simply don't comprehend. I make out some consonants, but nothing solid or full. This noise is terrible. My ears are aching, pleading for an end, and still I remain attentive to any changes in its presence. It's like I'm pulled by it towards the end of the hall wear I can swear something moves. I see nothing, but I know- I just have that feeling!

"Tea?"

I jump back into myself when Yugi's voice slips under the ringing noise. And then it's gone. The ring of a panicked, distorted creature fades back away from my ears and I can at last remove my hands from them.

"What's wrong?" he asks. _They didn't hear it_?

"I… I don't… never mind. Hey, can we get out of here? This is the one day of the week I don't have a single dance class, and I don't intend on wasting it."

"Sure. Yeah, let's go."

We head towards the doors, and I feel safer because I'm with my friends. I wouldn't recognize this feeling of protection if it wasn't needed. Perhaps I am just psyching myself out, but I've convinced myself that there is danger around me. I try not to let it show, but I think I'm just freaking the guys out when I keep bumping into their shoulders. They don't bother to look down the hallway that branches off the one we're walking down, but I do. And Angeline is there. She stands in the middle of the hall, just watching as we pass. I know our eyes have met, but she replies only with an unwavering, accusing glare that crawls beneath my skin.

_Tears have drawn out her mascara_.

* * *

><p>Mom isn't home again. She's probably out working- or partying, but basically the two are the same for her. She's what one may call an <em>exotic<em> dancer. I wave back at my friends, wish them a good night, and then lock the door behind me. I wait for the sound of Tristan's car to hum out of my driveway and down the street before I peel out of my uniform. Instead of what could be a mother saying "Hi, honey, dinner's on the table", or a dad folding a newspaper and raising an eyebrow to question where I've been all night, I am greeted only by the jingling of my cat's collar.

"Hey, Kuriboh." because that's what he looks like; a big ball of brown fuzz and bulbous yellow eyes that make me squee with delight. And I love my baby Kuriboh to a fault.

"You hungry, pretty boy? I know, I know." I lift him up into my arms like he's a human child. I swear this cat is my son. "I'm sorry I haven't been home. Hopefully mom's been feeding you. C'mon, let's go check your bowl."

Of course it's empty. Even the bag of dry food is empty too. Obviously my mom hasn't been home long enough to notice that the cat is basically starving. Not only that, but the kitchen is a sad sight of its own. Dishes piled in the sink, empty cabinets, and a fridge that smells like it's been thrown into a swamp and fished out again.

"I should've just gone with my friends to get some pizza or something." I grumble into the fridge. The only thing I can salvage for dinner are some seriously frost bitten turkey slices and some bagel roles. A few chunks of the turkey are given to Kuriboh while I wedge the rest between the bagel.

Kuriboh follows me up the stairs to my room. Thing is, though, it looks like a teenage girl lives in my room. Which is odd for me, because I don't remember leaving it so messy and I'm hardly ever here. If I'm not a school, I'm at work trying to pay for my hopes and dreams (aka: dance classes), and if I'm not at work, I'm using what time I have to hang out with friends, go to all my dance classes, do my homework, and somehow find a way to squeeze in all these duelist tournaments. I toss my uniform to the floor and chill out on my bed in one of the few pairs of pajamas I have.

But the last thing I want is to be left alone with my thoughts. They keep bringing me back to Angeline. All her frustration was so eager to sniff me out. She had no problem about blaming me for this horrible prank someone's been playing on her. And her tears. Her mascara was all down her face but I saw no sadness in her eyes as I passed. Come to think of it, I didn't see anything in her eyes. No sorrow, no fear, or remorse, no humanity. But the curse of "The Sands of Solipsism"? I've never heard of such a thing. The other ballerinas who played Sekherta were enchanting and just plain perfect in all their moves. There's no way they could have been plagued by this fear I see in Angeline or "Sekherta's evil spirit". No one knows for sure if the ballet is an entirely true story anyways.

_But maybe Pharaoh can help_. I think. _If anyone would recognize a spirit, it's got to be Yami. It's highly unlikely, but on the off chance that this isn't all just a hoax, Yami's my best bet on putting this all to an end._

Kuriboh leaps onto my stomach and curls up around my navel. If only it were so easy to shove the day away like that. To just curl up, all warm and soft, and sleep until the day is dead. I figure that's best. I have a big day tomorrow; with Madame Thibeault moving into dress rehearsals and stage practice. I need all the rest I can get, and to think about Angeline only prevents me from obtaining it. I just need to sleep, and hope that this drama dies with night.

And I think I'm doing that pretty well until my cell phone rattles the night with a dizzying hum and its bright light. I struggle in my drowsiness to get a hold of it, and squint until I'm practically blind when I lift the phone to my face.

_4:53 AM_

_NEW TEXT FROM SUMMER C._

_Hey, T. Sry 2 wake u. Its an emrgnc._

_Angelines in the hospital. _

**End Chapter**


	4. Act 1, Scene 4: Detectives

Act I, Scene IV

There is no chance of getting anymore sleep tonight, even though the promise of the weekend's late mornings are still calling me to my pillow. The words of the text are still swirling down my spine as I quickly dress in whatever's available. I end up in some dance sweats, my pink pajama tank, and some converse that I can swear were last worn when I was in the seventh grade. Calling Yugi was the first thing I did after reading the chilling words; that Angeline is in the hospital. It was like a reflex. And now he and his grandfather Solomon are waiting for me in the driveway of my house.

The sky is just beginning to blue around its edges and the morning air is un-breathed. But the wind that comes washes away the sweet sounds of larks and chirps, bringing with it a tension that chills me with breezy splinters. I can't even find the rumble of Solomon's old Toyota Camry in the coarse gust, or see that Yugi is waving me over to the car. The breeze runs its fingers through my hair. In my ear, the wind stows away a scream that no one heard. _Angeline's_.

"Tea, c'mon!" calls Yugi. I tear away from the wind and hop into the backseat. Compared to Yugi and Solomon, I look like a mess. A complete and total bum. Sometimes I have to wonder if the Muto family has something against wearing pajamas to bed, because they look like they've been dressed and ready to go since forever. Yet the there is another presence in the car that seems to be as distressed I am. Maybe not in appearance, because he doesn't quite have one, but in spirit. Yami is also wide-awake. Now, I'm not his aibou like Yugi, but his energy here in this confined space is certainly hard to miss. I can imagine him pacing back and forth inside the maze of his Millennium Puzzle. Because something is wrong. Something it out of place. And if it has _Yami_ startled, then that something is not likely to be a _natural_ something.

"I'm so sorry to have woke you." I say shyly. "I mean, after I got off the phone with you, I called Tristan for a ride but of course he didn't pick up."

"He's probably just sleeping." Solomon reassures me.

"Yeah. And it's ok, Tea. You sounded so frightened on the phone, of course we had no problem coming over here to pick you up."

"Thanks." I breathe, sinking into the leather. "I just… wish I knew where to go from here."

My words aren't meant to be heard, but I can tell they've picked up on them.

"Me too." chuckles Solomon. "Where am I taking you again?"

"The hospital."

"Hm? What happened?"

The car swerves around as he corrects his direction. I'm never really comfortable when Yugi's grandpa is driving, and that only adds to my bouncing nerves. There's just something I feel I need to be worrying about while under Solomon's outdated driving skills.

"Oh… my _friend_, she's been hurt." and that's the end of it. I don't want to say anymore about Angeline or what's been going on. I wouldn't even know where to start if I were to explain it all. I adore Solomon and I lo- I mean _like _Yugi. As a friend. Damn Freudian slips. Anyways, right now my words feel like razors in my throat and I don't want them to get cut. Yugi catches on to the easily swayed tangle of emotions that are all wrapped around me. He leans his head over his shoulder like he's listening to something Yami has to say. He nods, looks at me through the rearview mirror, and shoves his look away.

We arrive at the hospital around six in the morning. Summer and Hayden are already there waiting at the front desk. The moment they see me pass through the doors, they're running to me. Summer looks like she's been crying. Her eyes hint with red and her cheeks shimmer where only tears can fall. Hayden is more reserved and probably because he's just as much a friend to Angeline as I am. I'm sure he just came to be Summer's crying shoulder.

"Hey." I take Summer into my arms. Don't ask me how or why, but she's Angeline's best friend. I know I'd want someone to be there for me if one of my friends were in the hospital, even if that someone wasn't so fond of me or my friend.

"Have you been in to see her?" I ask.

"Yeah." Hayden rubs his head. "They just kicked us out because the cops finally got here. But we can go back in shortly they said."

"_The cops_? Just what exactly happened?"

"We don't know." Summer shakes her head worriedly. "She claims it was just an accident; that she was just dancing around in her room with a friend when she tripped. But the doctors disagree. They said her story doesn't match up with the medical evidence. And I… oh, Tea, just wait until you see her for yourself. It's awful."

She begins fanning away any tears that wish to escape, and Hayden squeezes her to his side. Yugi extends a hand to my shoulder where there is an immediate comfort there. I turn to him and our silence speaks for everything. We want to say we saw this coming, that we were going to stop it. But we hadn't thought it'd happen so quickly. Just this morning, Angeline was- well, I won't say she was fine…- but she was standing her ground. She was just trying to investigate whatever's been going on with her and it lead her to me, pinned against a row of steel lockers, and her flame-throwing accusations at my head.

A nurse who has clearly downed a bottle of Prozac flitters toward us. She's light on her feet and full of silicon and hairpins. It's like I'm seeing Angeline in some twenty or so years.

"Are you all here for miss Everstone?"

"Yes. Is she alright?" Summer leaps at the question.

"She's stable. But the detectives have allowed you all to come back in, so long as you don't mind them asking you a few questions."

"No problem."

I don't want Yugi to leave my side. So far, he's the only thing tying me down. Usually it's his presence that causes my nerves to pounce and my heart to stutter, but now I need his touch to keep me being _me_. He nods to his grandpa, who has no qualms about sitting down with some Reader's Digest, and catches me and the others down the hall.

An elevator lift and two corners later, Yugi and I are standing in the midst of Angeline's doorway. Suddenly I am not so eager to see her. I'm not quite sure I ever was in the first place. The amount of people in the room is one thing, especially taking into account that two of them are detectives, but it's more of the damage that arouses my sudden hesitation. _What if Angeline is unrecognizable? What if there's blood or really grotesque looking wounds? What if she doesn't want to see me? Or what if she's all in casts and bandages? Would that be my fault because I knew something was bound to happen? Is my failure to say something the reason for her being here_?

There is conversation coming from the room. From what I can make out, there's Summer who's babying her, Hayden who's just watching, the two detectives, and Angeline's mother. I see her wrinkled hand clasped over Angeline's. That's how I know it's her mother; because that's what my mother never did for me in _my _times of need. Yugi and I stay just outside the door. I'm starting to map my exit route out of the hospital by looking around and trying to remember where we came from. I want to leave. There really isn't anything more that I want in this moment than that. Coming here was a mistake and now I'm feeling it beginning to weigh in my stomach.

"I already told you," Angeline's toxic growls rise above all else. "Nothing else happened. I tripped! My head banged against my dresser and I pulled on the curtains to stop my fall."

"Yes, we know, Angeline. We're not saying we don't believe you. But what about the girl? Who was your friend? We need her to corroborate your claim."

"She's just some girl. Ok?"

"Angeline," her mother's voice coos, "these detectives are trying to help you. Please, honey, they need a name."

"You're going to arrest her, aren't you? You think she attacked me?" her words are feisty, but I only register a hopeless desperation.

"The doctors say your story doesn't match up with your injuries, miss Everstone. Now, when your mom called the police, the investigation of your room also brought up some pretty troubling questions. Like, how did your closet doors get smashed in? Where was your friend when the ambulance and police arrived? Why didn't your parents see or hear anyone leave the house? How come you didn't tell anyone you'd be having a friend over? We need to know who and where she is, Angeline. If she did something to you, you have to let us know so we can fix this."

A silence follows. I'm hoping that Angeline comes clean. I don't care anymore if she has the lead role. I don't care if the lead role is my favorite, most desired role ever. I don't mind being in the background if it means Angeline is safe in the spotlight. This isn't fair what's happened and somehow I can't help but feel that it's my fault. No one should end up in the hospital over a role in a ballet.

I'm looking ardently into the room now, waiting for the girl's identity to be revealed. Between the detectives' rounded bellies, I find a glimpse of Angeline. She's sitting up in the bed with her bedside mother growing older at the sight of her daughter so troubled. There's a whole patch of her silky, blonde hair missing. In its place there is only a pink scalp encrusted with dry blood. The side of her head is red with shock and purple with pain. One of her eyes is bulged and beat. It's like someone has chalked white and red dots on a lump of coal. Fleshly reds and violets trace around her neck in the portrait of fingers. The rest of her is covered in gauze and blankets. I'm not looking to see much else anyways.

But she's looking at me with eyes so cold that I am frozen within myself. I do not, can not, move.

"Her." she snaps, more so with her pointing finger than anything else. "She knows the girl. She's the one who told her to come to my house. And the boy too. It wouldn't be the first time either."

The husky detectives orbit around until they're facing me in the hallway. I back slightly into Yugi, stepping on his shoes, and he tries to steady me. Can't say it's working though, because my skin is wiggling with nerves. I'm literally about to pee myself I am so scared right now.

"And your names are?" the taller of the two men steps closer to me.

"T-Tea, sir. Tea Gardner. And th-this is my friend Yugi Muto."

"Yugi Muto?" the other detective jumps. "Wait, wait, wait- King of games, Yugi Muto?"

Yugi and I both nod modestly, hoping his celebrity gets us a "stay-out-of-jail-free" card.

"Well I'll be. This sure is my lucky night!"

His partner nudges him harshly and he coughs up a serious appearance.

"I mean," he clears his throat, "if you don't mind, we'd like to you ask you both a few questions."

"Right now?" I squeak.

"Yes. How about we go for a little ride? We'll call your parents and they should be able to pick you up at the station."

"Oh…. Ok."

_Do we really have much of a choice?_

* * *

><p>A ride in a detective's car isn't as bad as a ride in a police car. Not that I know what it's like to be in the back of a police car. I'm just saying. They've penned down our names and addresses, our birthdates and phone numbers. Yugi's grandpa just followed the car to the police station and waits for us outside the interrogation room. Oh my gosh. It feels horrible just to be thinking that I'm in here. <em>The interrogation room<em>. Ugh!

But what's even worse is that I can't be with Yugi for this. He's in another room, probably just as nervous as I am. The thing about Yugi, though, is that he's entirely innocent. I, on the other hand, knew that something was going on with Angeline. Yugi probably doesn't even know her last name. And that just brings me down further. Like dragging him to ballet class that one day, I feel pretty guilty about doing it.

"So, miss Gardner, how do you know Angeline Everstone?"

"We go to school together. She's also in my ballet class."

"So, you two are close?"

"Not really. We only talk when she wants to copy my homework or asks what we did at a ballet rehearsal she missed."

"Hmph. I see. Then do you know the girl Angeline was hanging around with last night? Perhaps it was a fellow classmate or dancer."

"No, sir. It's not really any of my business what she does after school."

"Well, Tea, we believe Angeline was attacked last night by a girl she says you and your boyfriend know. She says you _sent_ her to her house. Now, we want to know if this is true. And if it is, why."

I don't want to talk about Angeline. I want to go home and crawl back in bed like Kuriboh curls up into a ball. I'd rather be in another life or death duel in the shadow realm than to be here with this detective's double chins jiggling every time his tone accuses me of something. I know just as much about what happened to Angeline as he does and I'm too exhausted to try and work with him.

Without an instantaneous reply, he slips me the photos of the crime scene. I assume the wreckage is Angeline's room. The curtains are torn, the closet doors are bashed, and the tangle of clothes and blankets on the floor insinuates there was a struggle. But all I really see are all the trophies along her shelves. Most of them are for ballet and dance competitions. Every blue ribbon that I've ever competed for is thumb-tacked around her vanity. Practically all the victorious certificates I've prepared picture frames for are staring condescendingly from her lilac walls. All the trophies and medals I've drooled over are arranged along shelves and nightstands around her room.

Suddenly I'm glad her eye is as black as this day is turning out to be.

"Angeline came to me during school today. She seemed pretty upset; angry, mostly, and pushed me against some lockers. She said I was playing a prank on her, sending one of my friend's to scare her out of the main role in the ballet our dance company is performing. It was because my friends and I do a lot of studying on Ancient Egypt, and that's where the girl who attacked her was supposed to be from. But I swear I had no idea what she was talking about. I didn't want anyone to hurt her, but I knew something strange was going on. That's all I know, sir. That's all I know."

"Tea," he leans in real close to me, "do you know anyone who would want to harm her? Anyone who bullies her at school?"

She _is_ the bully at school. Almost everyone who knows her wants to hurt her in some way or form. But how do I say that to the guy investigating me for her assault? Do I even say it all?

But I don't have to answer because my mom is barging in the room. She toddles in her spindly high-heels and swings her purse over her shoulder like a real diva.

"This interview is over." she says between gum chews. "C'mon, Tea, we're going home now."

"Ma'am, if I could please just have a few more minutes with your daughter? A girl was assaulted and I'd really like to know who so I can bring them to justice." He's not asking a question.

"Are you charging her with something?"

"W-well... no. Not yet."

"Then I'm sorry, sir, but she's not yet eighteen. Until she is, she needs me or a lawyer present if you badged folk want to talk to her. Now if you'll excuse us, we're leaving. You have a nice day now."

She tugs at my arm and forces me to follow behind her. We pass by Yugi and his grandpa who apparently have been let out already. They probably couldn't get much information out of him anyways.

"Tea, what's going on?" he speedily strides alongside me and my mom.

"I have no idea. They don't seem to buy Angeline's story about tripping, though. Someone had to have attacked her."

"Purposely?"

"Is there any other way?"

"Tea!" my mom caws.

"Sorry. I gotta go. Bye, Yugi."

Mom pretty much drags me out of the police station while I can only stare back at Yugi. With his shoulders slumped and his eyes big, it breaks my heart that I have to leave him like this. He raced to pick me up this morning and is always there for me. This is how I repay him?

Mom and I don't talk much in the car. We don't talk much in general. She smells like alcohol and sweat, and I'm pretty sure there's a tinge of marijuana in the mix. But she doesn't drink- unexpectedly- so she can't be trashed. When I look at her under the passing street lights, I like to pretend she's scolding me. You know, like a good old tearing-you-down session. "I'm disappointed in you, Tea" or "what the hell were you thinking", I imagine her saying. But because we hardly talk to eachother at all, I have to improvise her voice because I don't remember what it actually sounds like. I pretend her lipstick isn't red enough to make the stop signs jealous, and that her eye shadow glitter doesn't reflect the entire city's lights. I envision her work uniform isn't as short and it buttons up her breasts.

"So… am I, like, grounded?" I finally say.

"Hm? Oh, yeah, sure. No TV for a week."

Well, gee. I guess that would be a pretty big deal if I actually watched TV at home. I guess she's giving this parenting thing a try, so I'll give the daughter thing a try.

"But mom!" I feign a whine. "That's so not fair! I haven't even done anything."

"Then why'd the police call me saying I need to pick you up? I was with some very important clients, boo. I don't get it. Are you doing this for attention or something?"

"No. It's all just a misunderstanding."

But that's as far as we get in this role-playing thing of ours. She doesn't care much for the truth because she can tell it's not all that entertaining. I honestly feel like the adult in our relationship. She's an exotic dancer, I'm a ballet dancer. I'm in the top of my class, she's a high school drop out. The only thing we really have in common is our shoe size.

I sigh, fiddling around with anything doesn't annoy her too much. The car lock has gotten boring, so then I move on to braiding and unbraiding strands of my hair. The day has finally begun with the sun's unwelcome arrival. It forces rays over the horizon and spews them into my dreary eyes. We reach a merge lane and mom asks me to look and see if it's ok to go. So I lean to the window, watch a few cars pass, and give her the all clear. I'm checking the mirrors repeatedly, glancing from one to another to make sure there's no one behind us or next to us. But there is someone behind us; a pair of dark, unblinking eyes, rimmed with black.

Mom slams on the breaks.

**End Chapter**

* * *

><p><em>I'm not very good at these cliffhangers or keeping you interested in reading this story, am I? Well, sorry. So instead, I've prepared my personal guarentee that in the next chapter, stuff's about to get serious. 'Kay, thanks, bye.<em>


	5. Act 1, Scene 5: Alone

**Author's Note:**

**Hello again, beautifuls. I do want to apologize beforehand for any grammatical errors your may find in this chapter. First off, it's my first time writing all in English by myself (well, ok, with a little help from my sis still), but I've been doing that since chapter one. Moreover, though, I'm typing this chapter with fake nails on and it's really difficult for me. This is why I don't usually wear them. So, please, bear with me and I will edit it when I get the chance. Thanks.**

* * *

><p><span>Act I, Scene V<span>

My stomach plummets. Mom is furious that the car behind us has nudged into our bumper, but really I think she's using that to cover up her shock and her fear. She's swearing off a storm while there is traffic starting to clutter behind us. While she's rambling on about negligent driving and how she wouldn't even be on the road if it weren't for me, I am conquered by assiduity in meeting the eyes that had brought this car to a halt. But there is no one in there. I lean around the front seat and sift through all the trash back there, feeling around the cushions and testing just how far my seatbelt will let me travel.

Perhaps it was only a reflection of something at the head of backseats, I wonder, or rather something outside the car. But it can't be. I looked in the rearview mirror just a second before to check for cars coming down the merge lane, and it was clear. So maybe it was something in the backseat. Yet the only things there are mom's cigarette boxes, her skimpy work costumes, and brown paper bags that I'm going to ignore the contents of. But as my hand feels around the surface of the seats, I am met by a lonesome frost. It is only in this one spot that cold air seems to hum below my fingertips, throbbing deep like a pulse.

_How strange_. I think. _Does mom have the air conditioning on in the middle of winter?_

And the only thing that comes to mind is that my hand is grazing someone's leg. It comes like a flash in my head, but I can see it; a white dress or skirt that is wrapped snug around the thigh that I'm touching. I want to be able to say that someone is here. I want to be able to say that all the shadows twisting around the contours of the car have made this their focal point. I want to be able to say that I'm hearing things; far off sobs, hushed, insidious growls, and that shrill ringing that's full of voices crescendo-ing in my ears.

"Move, bitch! Get your ass off the road if you don't know how to drive!" the other drivers yell. I jump. My hand immediately pulls away as I dive quickly for the front seat. My heart is palpitating erratically and I don't know how long it's been doing that. How long have I been looking in the backseat? How long was my hand frozen to that isolated chill? I truly feel that I've been sucked in by the shadows where time never ticks. I sink down into the body hugging cushion, checking the mirror again in case there should be answer staring back. But there's none. Mom rolls down the window to make sure everyone behind us gets a view of her dolled up middle finger and, basically, I just throw my head into the window.

"Dumb fucks." she hisses into her gum. "I mean, who do they think are bumping into me like that?"

"Mom, can we just go now?" I am so exhausted right now, I feel like my question, although simple, is a round of bullets firing from my lips.

"Geez, alright, boo. We're going."

I think she's starting to feel some sense of motherly duty, because her sigh isn't stressed. It's more like she's looking for a way to begin a sentence, and I'm really hoping she's not preparing to mount a monologue. I've sat through quite enough monologues, actually; mostly from Yugi's opponents when I watched him duel all those times. I guess I also could be guilty of such a thing as well. But, more importantly, I'm not ready for mom to hop on the emotional-speech bandwagon. Ok, I don't even want to imagine the sort of topics that could ensue from that; _Boys? Sex? The hardships of being a teen mom and high school drop out?_ No, sir. _So_ not having that conversation with my mom. Believe me, I don't need to hear her whole life story again, nor do I need her to tell me what I already know. I hang out with Joey Wheeler and Tristan Taylor for crying out loud! I'm pretty sure those are all the credentials needed to say I've passed Sex-Ed.

"You want some donuts?" she rubs my back from out of nowhere. And I thought the whole "creepy eyes and cold spot" thing was weird. I just look at her through squinted vision, caught a little off-guard by her "generosity".

"You know. For breakfast." mom tries again.

"I figured, but… just- you know what? I'm not all that hungry, mom. I don't think sugary foods will do my stomach any good right now either, so…"

"Oh. You feeling alright?"

"Well, after waking up at like five in the morning, seeing my friend in the hospital, having been brought down to the police station, and seeing creepy hallucinations in the backseat of the car, I guess I'm doing alright."

"Snippy, are we? Listen, I think you just need some time for yourself. You're stressed out, boo. You need a day to relax, get your nails done, all that jazz."

"Mom… that's not really my thing."

"And then maybe you could get all prettied up. Maybe catch some lucky boy's eye, hm?"

"Mom-"

"Oh, why not that Yugi boy? You two have been friends for quite some time. It's adorable. He's such a sweetheart too; what a rarity these days. Oh, Tea, he'd be perfect if only he were a little taller."

"Mom."

"I don't want midget grandchildren, that's all I'm saying."

"Mom! I can not believe you just said that."

"What?" she whines.

"Just drop me off at the theatre please."

"You have dance today? Don't you need to stop home first, pick up your stuff?"

"Nope. I have a locker there with all my goodies. Thanks, but I'm all set." I purse my lips, pleading silently that I will see the theatre come running into view by this next corner. I literally am about to explode. Personally, I think the voice I imagined her having is a lot more tolerable than her actual one. There's a reason why I forgot it. She sounds like she's two and she's going to cry at the end of every one of her sentences. But, even more than that, she doesn't know anything about me really. When I try to tell her stuff- _Random stuff! Girl stuff! My stuff! Anything_!- she doesn't find it very interesting because my life is not like the ones shown on, like, MTV or something. My life is full of card games, pointe shoes, and manual labor; three things that are probably at the bottom of her list.

Luckily, the theatre _is _right around the corner. I'm already unbuckling my seatbelt in case I need to dive roll out of a moving vehicle. She pulls into the parking lot- which is empty, of course. Rehearsals don't start for another two hours. But mom doesn't know that, nor does she need to.

"You never tell me these things, boo." she keeps rambling. "I don't understand, Tea. When I was your age, I told my ma everything."

"Well, that's because grandma has moral sensibilities and wasn't a stripper who brought surprise hubbies home."

"I'm an exotic dancer, not a stripper! _Ex-o-tic-dan-cer_. Oh my God, Tea, you're clearly in too bad of a mood to talk like a grown up. I'm not going to deal with you right now."

"Like you ever…"

"What?"

"Nothing." I slip out of the car.

"No, what'd you say?"

"I said you never deal with me. And, you know, being the 'cool mom who never yells at her child' sounds pretty awesome at first, but it's really not. Maybe I want you to scold me, or ground me, or complain when I fail a test. Look, Lily, or should I call you as my own teachers and of-legal-age friends know you; "Miss Misty". I'm sixteen. This is probably the most stressful, weird, and important year of my life. And I need a mom to be there for me and support me through thick and thin. I was just wondering if you were ever going to take the job."

And I slam the car door in front of her face. I feel pretty cool doing it- like _wham_!- but at the same, I want to open it again, hug my mom, and tell her I was just kidding. Ha-ha, right? We can just forget this? Nope. When it comes to reality checks, I've always had a tough time deciphering who they hurt more. The person giving the slap, or the person getting slapped? It's my mom, after all. She may be a bleachy, oblivious, somewhat condescending stripper- _exotic dancer, excuse me_- but she's my mother. And I hate it when she feels bad. She parties all night and she's plenty promiscuous, but at least to me, she's visibly invisible. My own mother is a cage within a cage. I wonder if anything at all is real to her; be it the pain, the degradation, the empty purse, the cries she has harping away in her secret heart. And I've just made it worse for her now.

Maybe we should have gone for those donuts instead.

* * *

><p>I think I'm having a "Joey" moment. Those times when you do things without thinking, blurt out something completely irrational and nonsensical, and end up suffering the consequences you failed to see coming? Yeah. <em>Those<em> are Joey moments. It's a little inside joke that Yugi, Tristan, and I have going on.

But I'm seriously thinking I'm having a Joey moment right now. Mom's gone home, rehearsals don't start for two hours, and now I'm sitting here on the steps in, like, two centigrade. Alone, moreover. In a tank top. With random cars driving by. Stomach aching from hunger. And, oh my God, this morning has been shat from the bowels of pure fail! So all I can do is just wait through the cold with shivering and my turbulent thoughts. But it's not like those are any warming either. Like some horrible gag reel, all my mind can summon is Angeline, and that leads me to the hospital, which then leads me to the detectives and the crime scene photos, and those eyes in the mirror, the white dress, and then mom, and slamming the door in her face- I can't take it!

_Angeline was attacked. She believes I know the girl who did it to her. She believes I sent her. Her, being an Egyptian-looking girl, and obviously someone who's very violent. Angeline's eyes is black. Pitch black. And bulbous. She says I know the girl who did it to her. She says it in front of cops, who take me to the police station. They ask me questions. I don't if they ask me a lot or if they're asking the same question again and again. It feel like it, but they ask me questions for what seems like hours. They show me photos. They're of Angeline's room and it's clearly a mess, a fight scene. Blankets are tangled, curtains are torn. Trophies. She has tons of them in her room. I can't stand her. I'm jealous? No, I'm… I'm angry. At her. For having what I want, what I worked for and didn't get. That's jealousy, though, right?_

A breeze spills all over me. It's just so bitter, like the cold burns down into my bones. For a moment, all I hear is the wind thrashing around my ears and through my hair. It rattles the plastic advertisements for the Winter Traditional and heaves great gusts through the flags. The main entrance doors behind me begin to sway and clash against their locks. I try to bury myself in arms and cuddle up to my knees for warmth, and it works I think. Just a little. I'm not sure how long I'm in this position, but the wind takes me into forever.

_Even if I am jealous of Angeline, that doesn't mean that'd I'd hurt her. I didn't. Haven't. Wouldn't? She has the wrong idea. But the detectives will probably want to see me again. With a warrant? Mom won't be happy. She already isn't. That's my fault. I know that for sure. How old was mom when she had me again? Lily Gardner. Miss Misty. Mom. I made her feel bad. Horrible. Can't I just blame this all on Angeline? If she hadn't… what about in the car? What else could make mom step on the breaks like that unless there was a sign for fifty percent off all lingerie? She must have saw it too. There _were_ eyes. My hand touched someone. Something was back there. I'm so tired. Why is this happening now? I have too much to deal with already. Like mom did before… I slammed the door in her face._

Forever ends with that same sound of a door slamming. It's the sound of metal clashing against plastic, and it's coming from behind me. My hair whips into my eyes as I turn to meet the open door before me. One of the doors has come unlocked and it sways into the wall with the breeze as its guide. _Only one door_. It is so dark inside that I begin to question if my mom dropped me off at the right theatre. I'm used to walking into a bustling main entrance with sparkling marble floors and modern art clinging to every inch of the place. I'm used to pushing past these doors with my arms too burdened with school books and dance equipment. I always ran through here, knowing I wasn't anywhere near on time for practice, and sneaking a quick greeting to Abbey who works at the front desk. This empty darkness is nothing like that. It is dead inside.

But I'll be dead outside, my body preserved for the coroner in a block of ice, if I stay out here any longer. It's not welcoming, but I enter anyways. I've never realized how grand this place really is. Perhaps it's because there are no lights on, but the entrance feels so much larger now that I'm alone. I didn't know that there was an echo in here, and now that I hear it, chills not related to the wind are trickling down my spine. I'm kind of, sort of, somewhat, but not really, freaked out about being here by myself. I wonder if the janitor is already here and that's who let me in, or if Abbey is in the employee office sipping coffee. Just thinking that someone else is here is a little comforting.

"Hello?" I call. "Abbey? Mister Janitor-person? I… I know I'm early, but anyone here?"

I shut up when my echo retorts back.

"Ok. Guess not." I mutter under my breath. I've never really been afraid of the dark, but thinking of that fear as only a basic human instinct makes me a little more ok with giving into it. See, I'm not scared, it's just natural to be a little on edge. Right? Right. I swear things are jittering all around me, the shadows shifting in taunting, uncertain hazes. But I will not put on a horror show for all the security cameras to see.

After stumbling on some shadows like my talented self does, I finally make it to the locker room. For once, there is a light switch that I know how to get to. It's just at the side of this door and I don't have to worry about dying because of tripping on the benches that split the rows of lockers. There is hope yet! My fingers feel for the switch, and I think I've just about found the crease of it when my hand caresses over something too unshapely and too clammy to be the light switch. A pulpy air teems across my face. And like a wave, I find it recedes and reaches for me again and again.

It sounds like breath.

"Hello?" I finally pout. I'm almost positive that if I reach out right now that I will feel the softness of a person. And from the feel of the it, the person is just about my height and just as freezing. But then why would this person be skulking around in the dark, sordid locker room? Alone? Why wouldn't they make a noise when I came in, or ask who was there? The more I think about it, the more squeamishly my nerves writhe.

I don't want to move. I really don't. Yet I muster up all that I can find in me, whether it be courage or curiosity, or even the ignorance hormones bathe in, and flip the switch anyways. I step back when there is nothing there.

"No." I shake my head. "No, but… someone was there?"

It feels like I'm falling when I'm actually sitting down on one of the benches. All I need is a few deep breaths and the movement of my fingers running through my hair. Still, even that hasn't entirely woke me.

"Ok, calm down, Tea. You're tired. Really, really tired. You woke up at five in the morning and it's been a trying day since. You're exhausted, you're stressed; anything goes at this point. Just wake up, get ready, and call it a day. C'mon, you can do this."

Because that's what I do, actually; give myself pep-talks. I'm pretty good at pep -talks too, if I do say so myself. Except this time, saying it out loud really abates the gossip of nerves. I have to gather myself for a moment before I'm pulling my hair back into the classic ballet bun and slapping on some cover-up powder. There's really no need for makeup since I'll probably be sweating a good portion of it off, but I throw on some highlights and make sure to mask the dark circles under my eyes. I finish off my face with some blush, and then comes the most important aspect of a ballet dancer; the feet.

I haven't worn the pointe shoes from my locker in a while, so I spend a good half hour or so bending, breaking, snapping, and massaging them until they're mended just right. They're Capezio pointe shoes and therefore feel a little strange when I slip in and out of them to check the arch. I'm far too used to my Grishkos, because I've worn and broke them in with all my barre hours. The laces on them are a little torn, hence why I haven't worn them in so long, but the last thing I want to do is wander around the dark again in search of the sewing room. No needles for me right now.

I wrap my toes in medical tape and lace my shoes over my shoulder so I don't trip walking in them. I'm about ready to head out to the main studio that we use to practice, but I'm not ready to turn off the lights. The rest of the girls will be in here to drop their stuff off and what not anyways, and minding the fact that I'm totally terrified, there really isn't any reason to turn it off. So I leave the door open and let the light pour out to the rest of the hall.

9:15, the illuminated clocks read. _So I've got a little less than an hour. At least there's some good news. And the custodians should be here any minute. Also good news._

My bare feet tap out the seconds along the marble. Even though my steps are causing a small stir, nothing really speaks to me anymore. All the hallways are dark, but tame enough for me to move on without so much as a jolt. Each is lit only by the red glow of exit signs. I've been down this way enough times to know where I'm going now, and I'm so close too, but instead of seconds, my footsteps are tapping out the beats of music. My hand is resting on the post of the studio door and yet I can't quite force myself to step in. I know the music too. It's the love theme from _The Sands of Solipsism_. However faint and iridescent the sound of the orchestra is, it's not very difficult to pick out the melody.

And if the orchestra warming up means there's people around, then that's where I want to be.

I follow the strings and the woodwinds out towards the stage, this time with a skip in my step as I fly around corners and down the halls. This is why I'm always hanging out with friends. This is why I'm not meant for a spotlight solo. This is why I'm never going to have my mom drop me off early again no matter how annoyed I get with her. I hate to be alone. I've hated it since I was very young. One time, my mom left me at the doctor's office. I mean, even though the fat ladies from the front desk were giving me lollipops and babying me, I was crying louder than I'd ever cried before. I didn't know those people! And what if their candies were poison; like the ones my teachers used to tell me to have my mom check on Halloween? Of course, mom realized half way home that I wasn't screaming in the car seat, so she came back and got me. Naturally.

The love theme ends just as I navigate through all the curtains and ropes. It's like everything is right on cue; my entrance is somehow planned by an elusive stage crew. I check the beams that line the ceiling in case they're there prompting me to go on, but there's just a bunch of lights and wires.

"Hello?" my echo asks before I realize I do.

Three taps against a music stand is my only reply. A conductor there stands in the orchestra pit, with all his musicians encompassing him. He's tall and trim, with a full beard and mustache too. It's a little odd, however, that everyone is all dressed up like it's opening night; full black coats and everything. They're all fancied up and strung with the scents of heavy colognes and that freshly showered musk. I've never seen this conductor before or any of the pale looking figures readying their instruments. I'm a little disappointed that it's not Richards in charge of the music today. I've been working with him since I joined the company, and he knows each of us dancers so well. That's what makes him such a charmer to work with, especially when he trains the music to match our individual styles. But I guess I can go with this new guy.

He outstretches his arm to welcome me onto the stage. His smile, I think, spans an even greater distance. It's so strange, though. It's like they've all been expecting me. But how can that be?_ I _wasn't even expecting me to be here. He tries to lure me again with a gesture that erases any timid feeling I may have. I nod, shoving my stuff down to the side and scrambling to get my shoes on. Usually I take such care in lacing my pointe shoes, but now with this opportunity to dance solo and what I think is pride bubbling inside me, I quickly tie them and tuck in the excess ribbon.

"What shall I dance?" I ask sheepishly.

He says nothing, only smiles and turns to his musicians. With a wave of his baton, the violins begin the theme for Sekherta. As far as I can see, no one sits in the audience to watch and ridicule me. So why do I feel so uneasy? Why am I so afraid to step up onto my toes and dance the role I've always wanted to dance? Then the cellos start to sob and the oboe begins to weep. I know I can dance this piece. I did it just the other day in front of everyone in the studio.

The conductor turns around again, still flicking the wand that the musicians obey. He gives a nod with his head that's me telling me not to be shy. I can not deny his grin and the longing that it bears. I take a step out onto center stage and latch my movements in the melody. As soon as I am dancing _en pointe_, everything feels just fine. I have no worries, I have no shame. I have nothing but the music circling me and guiding me through the story of Sekherta as she descends into insanity. Nothing matters but telling that story.

I feel so at ease with the dance that I am able to close my eyes and still not falter. All that is left of me is the music. I see flames. Every second, I am being thrown into the visions of flames and then brought back into the blackness behind my eyelids. I can feel the fire rising around my legs. The flames are curled by my spins and my jumps; it only obeys me. A ballerina dances upon a stage on fire. I see her as I am now, except this girl in my head surely isn't me. She and I leap at the same time, only she just nearly dodges a falling beam. Flashes of a panicked audience all running towards the doors are the only intrusion on our dance. She carries on, graceful as ever, and oblivious to the flames that try and burn her world.

Then all I see is myself sitting in the audience. It is just me and the flames that watch this girl dance. Violins screech and clarinets squeak every time a new image strikes at my mind. First, it's music sheets scorching and charring, and then it's those eyes again. Sekherta's beautiful, unblinking eyes, framed by her Ancient Egyptian kohl. She stares at nothing and at everything, through me and at me.

"Tea?"

Everything shuts off. My eyes tear open. Sweat prickles around my face and all down my arms. My heart punches against my ribs like I've just awakened from a horrible nightmare. Madame Thibeault stands between the rows of curtains. She's applauding me, but all I hear is my heart thump, thump, thumping away.

"Oh, that was… that was- oh! Je suis trés surpris. Ce qui ètait beau dans tous les sens. Je n'ai aucun moyen de le décrire!"

"Oui." I pant, though I've no idea what she just said. Something about surprise and not having words and yeah. "Merci beaucoup, Madame Thibeault."

"Tea Gardner, you've made me very, very proud right now. Forgive me for not seeing your talent before. It's just that the crowd has always adored Angeline and Summer as lead roles, I could not deny them their pleasure. But change is good, no? They will adore you as well soon. I think I've just found the company's new Queen of Egypt. Our new Sekherta. What do you think?"

What do I think? I think she's got to be out of her mind. Angeline will kill me if she finds out Madame Thibeault has officially replaced her! Replacing her in general is bad, but with me of all people? All I can think of is her threat: "_I'm not leaving the ballet, and that role is mine. You got it? I'm Sekherta, and if you ever try again to take my place, those pretty ribbons on your pointe shoes are going to be around your neck_."

I don't even recall dancing just now. All I remember is the conductor urging me on, and then it was up in flames after that. Literally. There was just some ballerina dancing, although her audience had long since left and a fire still raged around her. Everything was on fire. I don't know when the music stopped or how many dances I've done, but Angeline killing me is one thing I _am_ certain of.

Madame Thibeault wraps an old arm over my shoulder.

"Are you sure you're not related to Mikhail Baryshnikov? That was splendid beyond words, miss Gardner. I saw all the pain and grace that the role of Sekherta requires. Ah! If that is what you can do without music, just imagine the magick you can dance with a whole orchestra parading you through the story!"

"Wh-what?"

What does she mean? I _was_ dancing to music. The whole orchestra was here, and the conductor too!

But when I look out over the stage, no one is there to bring instruments to life or enrapture an audience with notes. It is only me and Madame Thibeault who are applauded by an entire theatre full of no-ones and nothings.

**End Chapter**

**Prepare for ACT II, SCENE I!**

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><p><strong>The bending, breaking, and massaging of pointe shoes<strong> - For a ballet dancer, you've got to be out of your mind to dance in pointe shoes straight out of the box. Ballet shoes need to be torn and mended to the individual dancer's feet for both comfort and to avoid injury. This is usually somewhat of a process to get them molded to the foot shape without over-arching them; from folding them, ripping them, adding wool or gel, massaging them, and sometimes even keeping the shank of the shoe on a heater for a short time. To "break in" your pointe shoes simply means to have them conform to your foot so you can dance properly in them.

**Capezio / Grishko **- Basically, these are two types of pointe shoes. There are, of course, many more options than these. These are simply the two that I know most of because I used to use them.

**Tea wraps her toes with medical tape** - This is very common amongst ballet dancers. It's to protect your toes during and after dancing "en pointe". Ballet dancers must take care of their toes if they plan on dancing long, which means they go through a lot medical tape, salt baths, and shoe softeners.

**En Pointe **- Dancing with pointe shoes and/or on your toes.

**Barre hours / practice ****- **This is warm up practices, for the most part, where shoes are tested and muscles are readied for the hard work of dancing. It's basically standing with a bar attached to a wall or nailed to the ground and using it for support, balance, and marking your arm/foot placements.

**Mikhail Baryshnikov** - Only a God of the Stage. He's probably one of the best dancers in the world, and not just in ballet. He's also a producer and actor (mostly known for his amazing dancing in the movie 'White Nights'.)


	6. Act 2, Scene 1: Practice For Your Finale

**Blood & Gore WARNING for this chapter**

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><p><span>Act II, Scene I<span>

I don't think there was a single person in the classroom whose mouth didn't drop when Angeline walked in. Even now, as she sits idly in her window-side desk, there are whispering classmates who still try to lean over their desks for a greater view of her. It's sad, really. I mean, yeah, I totally wanted her to fall down a flight of stairs at one point, but I didn't want her to look like… well, how she does now. Angeline could have easily been in the top five, if not top three, prettiest girls at Domino High. She had long, flowing curls of blonde hair and eyes that were so green I swear you could smell a freshly cut lawn. I can't say that all the boys _loved_ loved her, but they "loved" her, if you know what I mean. Not that I could ever blame them. Her cup size could rival Mai Valentine's!

But now it's not her breasts or her youthful eye color that everyone's staring at. Now it's the cap she wears to hide what little hair she has left. Now it's the blotches of livedo and continent-sized bruises that map out her struggles and indignity. Now it's that boulder of a black eye and the harkening bags under the other. The school uniform does her arms and torso some justice, but her legs are just long, bare bait for raised eyebrows and sneering murmurs. They too are stained with the shadows of violence, and not even the boldest and most expensive earrings and bracelets she has on will attract eyes away from that.

"Damn. What happened to her? Did she get a hit by a truck?" I hear the other students say. But mostly I hear the voice of Brett Banson, who doesn't hesitate in the least to bash on his ex-girlfriend.

"Or two, or three. And then maybe the truck crashed after falling off a cliff." he chuckles with a cough.

"I bet it's her dad. Rich guys like that always have a dark side."

"Oh, wait! Maybe it was 'the scary lady'. Watch out, guys, I think the school may be a haunted."

"Yeah, by a ghost who has a fetish for ugly blondes."

They tease Angeline with ghost noises. From the sound of it, and especially coming from the squad of potheads Angeline always hung out with, she's been harping away about curses and ghosts for quite some time. I think it's safe to say that Angeline has some unresolved issues- _drug related issues_- perhaps from when she fell head over heels for the renown junkie Brett Banson. I don't even think that's his real name! But everyone knows him as such. It's like his drug dealing name or something. Whatever. Apparently she was _madly_ in love with him; the "madly" part coming from when she started doing some serious drugs just so they could hang out. But he was never serious about her, and so after they… you know… _did it_, he just dumped her. Everyone knows the story. Even Yugi and I who tend to stray away from such gossip.

Now, it's not like I've debunked the whole "spirit" thing. I mean, duh! Yami; who I still need to talk to. The spirit of an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh that inhabits my best friend / future boyfriend and prom date's body? Yeah. I guess I could say I believe in ghosts. Especially when I'm crushing on one. But now I just have another alternative. And this possibility seems a lot more like the kind of stuff I _want_ to believe. I_ want _to believe that Angeline is just a druggie and doesn't want her parents to know. I _want_ to believe that the "spirit" she's seeing and the violence she's putting herself through are just hallucinations from the meth. What I _don't_ want to believe is that _The Sands of Solipsism _is actually cursed. But unless someone is slipping something into my Lucky Charms every morning, the drug theory really doesn't explain the weird things happening to _me_…

But Brett and his gang of stoners just don't stop mocking Angeline. I can't believe how bad I feel for someone I dislike so much. I know she hears them all too. She hears every cutting piece of bullying and slander, and for once, the popular girl was the one getting torn down as she had to others. Including me. But does that make it right? Do I just sit here and watch with this guillotine chowing down on my gut? I know what Yugi would do. And Joey and Tristan too. They'd all rush to Angeline's aid, stand in place of her if it meant fending off a bully. I could see them getting ready to, even now in the rows beside me. But what would _I_ do? Do I truly believe in those sideline pep-talks I always broadcast to Yami or Joey when they duel? Or maybe I'm just going to sit here because I know as soon as Angeline hears that I've replaced her in the ballet, she's going to lynch me with my own ballet ribbons.

Do I save someone who is only going to kill me afterwards?

"Hey!" I stand. "Leave her alone, you guys. _All of you_."

I make sure the whole class hears me.

"I don't understand any of you. You're supposed to be her friends, and yet you turn on her so viciously because she has a few cuts and bruises? Because she's not as pretty as she usually is?" - well, it was little more than a _few_ cuts and bruises - "What's wrong with you? You have no idea what she's gone through, and if anything, you should be comforting her right now. But, of course, it seems you are all as fake as Brett's name."

Ok, so maybe it wasn't the best of speeches, but it'll do. I hope. But Brett Banson, or whoever the hell he is, isn't having any of it. His pals try to hide their laughter, as if the thing that took all my courage to do was a joke. A meaningless, infantile joke. My face had never been redder, but I would stand behind what I said. I may not like Angeline that much- or at all- but if there was ever a time for us to team up, it would be now. And quite frankly I think she's just too beaten to even acknowledge the sacrifice I'm making for her right now.

I kind of wish I hadn't said anything at all and let her rot. I wish that I hadn't cared or listened at all to anything the school assemblies about anti-bullying had to say. If this were anyone else but Angeline, I'd probably feel different. There'd be pride in it as I'd protect another defenseless school-mate from a Neanderthal like Brett Banson. But this is _Angeline Everstone_! She wasn't defenseless, she _was _a bully, and she almost knocked my lights out the other day when she shoved me into the lockers. She's a mean, mean girl and yet I'm standing here saving her when she doesn't even bother to look up!

Brett looms over me. The smell of weed encumbers him like it's his aura. I recognize the smell simply because of my own party-going mother. He's not looking for a fight, especially not with a girl half his size, but he seems set on taunting me a little more. He wants me to cower. If this were a duel, I'd take him out right now. Attack his life points directly. But this is life, and it's a game I've yet to learn all the rules of. So I stand there, not quite sure I'm ready for even half the situations I'm cogitating in my head, but I refuse to let this bud-bully win.

_Kill him_. My body bemoans. _Kill him_. The blood in my own veins feels like a heavy snake making its merry way to my right arm. My fist clenches in response. On its own, even. I've never known this rush before. It seeps deep into my gut, adrenaline soaking into the crevices in my brain and leaving no room for anything else but to _kill Brett Banson _and _now_. The urge to take his life and the will to fight that are constricting; two nooses choking the amygdala and the conscience. I've never willed any one to die. I mean, not to this extent and never aloud. But this? This is… not me. I can hardly control my own body. And already I'm seeing a dagger clenched between my fingers. I've no idea how it came to be in my hand, but it's there. I can feel it! The archaic handle, crusted already with dry, murdered blood.

With a macabre flash, I see where the blood has been drained from. Spewed from, more like it. I think it's my hand- _but it can't be!_- that plunges the dagger into a blurry mass that I make out as person. The scream that follows can't be anything but human. And it's a woman's too. She's a white and beige blur, with swirls of blues and yellows dabbed mostly on her arms and neck. The room I'm in is poorly lit with what I perceive as candles struggling against the winds of this woman's panic. Yet the blood I feel, so warm and so soupy, is everywhere. I want her to scream more. I want her to beg me to stop, which I never will. I want Brett Banson's muscles to break and his nerves to squirm around the blade each time it punctures. I stab again and again, only to realize that I haven't actually moved. Brett still stands before me and I before him.

_How long has it been like this_? _Where did all that even come from_?

That wasn't… me. Was it?

Luckily I don't have to ponder on that or look even more ridiculous than my heroic move made me. Joey's hand is already gripping Brett's shoulder, and not in his usual 'hey, what's up' kind of way. He's pulling him slightly away with just the hook his fingers have on him, and the dagger from my hands has vanished.

"I don't think you want any trouble here, man. So I suggest you sit down and listen to the lady. Kapeesh?"

"Hmph. Whatever. I wouldn't waste my time on an ugly girl like that anyway."

Even Yugi stands for that one.

"Listen, pal, my best chick friend is not ugly!" Joey's got Brett's collar wound tightly in his fist.

"I think you owe her _and_ Angeline an apology. Unless you want Joey here to make amends _for_ you with two black eyes." Yugi added a little more aggressively than I thought he ever could have.

"Alright, alright. Whatever. My bad, Tea. You too, Angeline."

But Angeline isn't there to accept it. Only droplets of blood and what I assume to be tears remain where she had sat. Somewhere in all the attention spent on me and Brett, Angeline must have snuck out of the classroom. Bleeding too. A normal person would go to the nurse, but I don't think Angeline is feeling all that normal today. It's just a hunch, but I highly doubt she'd go there.

Something tells me I need to move. I need to get out of that classroom and find Angeline. _Quickly_. I don't care if it makes a scene, so long as I find her and she is ok. So before anyone can say anything about it, my heels dig into the floor and push me off.

"Tea?" I hear Yugi call behind me. But I'm gone. I'm already out, and running straight towards my teacher. He catches me with a quizzical brow and then an overruling flare.

"Miss Gardner? First off, why are you not in class? Homeroom is almost over. Second, why are you running in the halls?"

"Please, I'm sorry, Mr. Maaki. It's an emergency. Please don't mark me late, I'll be right back!"

"Fine. Go. But hurry back."

"Thanks!" I'm already turned around, bolting to the bathrooms, before he can do or say anything else. There's a trail of blood. Not, like, a huge one from a body being dragged or something. It really can only be spotted if your _looking_ for a blood trail. She probably just tore a stitch or something. That would be bad, but I could deal with it. I really just hope my gut feeling isn't right.

Nearer and nearer I become to the girl's bathroom, the wider the trail grows. It gets this way until I see a bloody handprint on the door and smudges of it around the latch. I feel like a commando busting open the door like I do. It shudders, sending a crazed vibration through each of the stalls.

"Angeline?" I say with hardly any breath in it.

She vomits in the third stall. She's hunched over the toilette, I assume, by the way her knees are bolted to the floor in her stance of regurgitation. I almost retreat into one of the stalls myself and spew at the sounds of her coughing, scathingly heaving chunks of burning displeasure and then them plunking into the toilette water in great masses.

"Tea? Is that you?" she wheezes between spills.

"Yeah. Are you ok?"

"I could use a few paper towels."

"Right." I crank the dispenser hurriedly but efficiently, balling up for her as big a wad I see fit. We complete the transaction in the slot below the door. My throat burns just hearing her gag.

"Will you be alright? Do you need me to get a teacher or the nurse?"

"No." she states perfectly clear. "Please, just stay here."

"Sure."

I wait. She throws up a little more, but it becomes less and less as the minutes roll by. So much for 'being right back'. Any longer and Mr. Maaki is sure to send security down. He's _that_ kind of teacher.

Angeline flushes the toilette but she doesn't come out. I hear her stand and watch her feet turn outwardly to face me. She leans against the door and waits for me to do the same. I've no idea where this is going, but I do it anyway, pressing my ear towards the door to match where I think hers is. The tips of our shoes meet, but that's as close as I get to her without the door parting us.

"Tea?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you."

"Oh. No problem."

"No, I mean for taking this all away."

_What?_

"I don't under-"

"You're the new Sekherta, I hear."

"Oh. Yeah, I… I'm sorry. I just… I wanted to dance and then Madame Thibeault saw… and it's so messed up."

"The orchestra wasn't there when you danced, was it? The conductor?"

"He… what? No, he was, but…"

"He wasn't _there _there."

"I guess. A-Angeline, how do you know all this?"

She chuckles. I can just imagine her fancy, overly-glossed lips bending to a smile, if not a wicked one. It's a trademark of hers.

"I am very well practiced in the role of Sekherta. Believe me, you will need talents you wouldn't imagine a ballet dancer possessing."

"Like…?" to all my faults, I genuinely am intrigued to know.

"Have you ever tried to breath beneath water? Sleep on blades? Or smile while your flesh burns?"

My lungs feel like mere punching bags for my heart as it punches and punches some more. I've had my concerns all along, but now I know it. Something is terribly wrong. Although I can't say I've ever been the closest to her, Angeline would never act this way. What in the world was she talking about? Drowning, burning, blades. Blood on the door. Blood on the floor. _Blood. Blood. Blood_.

"Angeline!" I want her to stop. I try pushing, then pulling, then slamming myself at the door to get to her. She fights even harder against me with a strength I never imagined she had. Nothing I do makes a difference. Her voice only gets louder, more emphatic about every twisted distortion she tongues. There is a pressure of ten people holding that door close versus my small, meager one.

"Can you pirouette while you hang by your neck? Can you dance with razors between your toes? Can you continue smiling, keep going, keep dancing, keep telling that damned story of _hers _when the stage and your audience is on fire? What then when the evils applaud for your final bow? She'll close the sarcophagus on you! She'll close the sarcophagus on you! She'll close it, Tea!"

She's frantic, tearing me down with the blades in her voice. It feels painful to even imagine screaming like that. It's not very Angeline- or human- at all.

"Angeline, please! Stop this! You need help!"

"She'll help you practice all that." she starts moaning in her sobs. "She'll help you practice for your finale."

"Open this door, Angeline! Please, whatever it is you are planning, just… please!"

And with a scream far more tormenting than the rest, blood runs down onto our shoes. I jump back, horrified by the pool that is beginning to coagulate over the white tiles. It traces along the grout, trekking its ways down the drain in the center of the floor, and I am in far too great of a consternated state to think of just how much I cower.

Blood on the door. Blood on the floor. _Blood. Blood. Blood_.

"A-Angeline…?" I think I say, when I'm sure it sounds more like some jumbled, misconstrued way of saying 'jelly'. I hop down from the sink, which I don't remember leaping up to, and blood squishes under my school shoes. As if my heart has met with a defibrillator, it speeds into action, thrusting myself without thought to the stall and pull the door open.

I scream at the torn, mangled sight that is Angeline's body, now fallen against me. There is a mess of wires from her stitches that have cleaved that canyon into her neck. Her head flops backwards in my arms, and still manages to stay attached with the meager flesh she left herself.

She pulled out her own stitches and used the wires to saw through her throat.

And then somewhere in an amalgam of body fluids- between her blood that rolls across the floor and into my uniform, my inability to keep my stomach, and the tears of horror that shoot from my eyes- I cry, panic, and shatter my vocals for help.


	7. Act 2, Scene 2: Believe Me

Act II, Scene II

Hands. Blurs. Blood. That's all it is. Hands touching me, shaking me, taking Angeline from my arms. Blurs moving around me, tailored suits and long limbs stirring the air and grazing the scene. Blood on me, in the creases of my fingers, sinking down the drain, coloring Angeline's hair. That's all it is.

"Miss," there's a touch on my shoulder, "are you alright? Miss?"

I don't know if I answer. I think my lips move. Or maybe it's the tears that slip between them, or the blood that's drying there. Something moves there. But the man holding me nods and lifts me from the floor. As if my legs can even move at this point.

I've seen death before. In the movies, but in real life too. My dad died. I was three. I didn't see him die, but I saw him dead. At the wake and at the scene too. When I was younger, I used to pretend that it was one of those day shows Mom watched while she cleaned the house- back when she used to do stuff like that. He'd go to the hospital, maybe stay in a coma for a few seasons, and then he'd wake up when I'd visit him because there needs to be a dramatic twist while Mom is seeing another man. Which she usually was anyways.

When we got to the scene- the set, rather- paramedics were scavenging around him. Lights flashed and sirens sang. I know mom cried. Like, cry cried. Not her usual "I-am-so-high-right-now-so-I-feel-like-sobbing-childishly" cry, but _really _cried. There was nothing Hollywood about that night. Makeup smudged, the hero didn't win, and the soundtrack was a horrible, horrible mesh of reality and the years that followed.

And the show was cancelled anyways, it seems. Because he never did come out of that coma.

I just know now that I'm being whisked away by a man who could very easily be on steroids, and that Angeline's hair is so long and tangled, it catches in the zipper of the body bag. My friends are close by. I hear them- mostly Yugi- calling for me, but they are held back by more officers. There are so many people here with police vests and jackets. So many staring eyes that need be herded by the officers. And they're all looking at me, orchestrating rumors, asking what happened, if I did it.

This is why I wasn't chosen to be Sekherta in the first place. All I can think of is that. The ballet. Not how I'm being snuck into the back of a police car or how the school is in a frenzy. Not how my friends are yelling my name, telling me it's going to be ok. I only think about how I can't do this; Sekherta's role. How I can't see with this spotlight shining in my eyes. How Angeline may be enjoying her body being paraded and carried into the gazes of onlookers. It's just how it was when she'd been dancing. When she'd been extolled in a leading role, like Marie in The Nutcracker or Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty. When she'd been adorned in her tiara and tutu, taking her bow, smoking behind stage, posing for the picture that's to be on the ballet poster, laughing, leaping, twirling. When she'd been breathing.

* * *

><p>I was right. I would see the detectives again, and mom isn't happy. I'm not sure if I'm thankful or if I'm annoyed. She doesn't show up to my performances, appointments, or school ceremonies, but she comes to the hospital when I'm about to questioned to death. And in her work clothes too. She wonders why I don't even bother to ask her to see me dance anymore.<p>

_I'm fine. I'm alright_. I keep trying to tell everyone that, but it seems almost like I haven't spoken a word. They only nod, smile politely, and continue taking my blood pressure and hooking me up to a whole bunch of blinky stuff.

"Why were you in the bathroom with her?"

"To check on her." is all that I say. The first time I explained it, it was an elaborate story- and nonfiction too- but this is all that's left of it. A laconic, tired reply that shows my boredom in retelling it.

"Why you? You, the same girl she identified as her attacker or someone who knew the attacker. You're connected to this case in more ways than one, miss Gardner."

"I already told you, sir. No one else noticed she'd left. I was defending her against some bullies, and then when a few others guys who are my friends took over the situation, I noticed she wasn't in her seat. There was blood on her desk and a trail leading out. So I followed it to the bathroom. I was worried. Angeline wasn't herself."

"And what happened there? One more time, just tell us what she said."

"I saw her feet under the stall. She was throwing up so I offered to help; got her some paper towels, and stayed with her like she asked me to. I'm telling you, all I saw were her shoes. She wouldn't come out of the stall. She started going on about the ballet we're in, how the lead role is a lot harder than you'd think. She said… she said I had to know how to breathe underwater, how sleep on blades, smile while I'm burning. It was so unnerving. By then I knew something was wrong so I tried to convince her to come out. But…"

"She was dead when you finally opened the door."

His words, so blatant and yet true, snagged at my heart. I hadn't let it all in sink in until then, when these two detectives were eyeing me down as I sat in my bloodied uniform. I spy mom out of the corner of my eyes. Knowing that she's here just makes the truth even thicker in air swelling in my lungs. It's serious because she's here. She's never there.

"Yes." I hardly squeak. The tears come. I try to stop them, if only even a little bit. I've no way to hide from the stage lights of the detectives' eyes. The last time my mom saw me cry was when my old friend Genevieve joked about Yugi being her boyfriend when we were in, like, kindergarten. Even then I knew we were meant to be together, and there is nothing I want more than for him to be here right now. I hate the cops who held him back in the hallway before, so he couldn't come to me and give me the hug that would make everything better or speak to me the words that would simply make everything go away.

"Oh, Tea." says mom, coming around to me. "Please, detectives, can't you see she's been through enough already? She's told you everything she knows."

The detectives look at each other and then back at me. One scrutinizes me more than the other, yet the combined accusation there is repulsive. They think I did it. They think I killed Angeline Everstone over some ballet rivalry.

"We appreciate the help, miss Gardner. Now, if you remember anything else, I want you to call me. Ok?" the less accusing one hands me his card.

"Sure." I say, although I don't plan on ever seeing this man or his Twinkie-holic partner again. I know I'm innocent. That's what's important. There isn't any evidence to convict me, or to even charge me for that matter. But that doesn't mean anything i solved. I have to talk to Yami. He and Yugi must have figured _something_ out by now, with the way they're always together and all. The detectives leave and my hands are cuff free. Just how I like them. It's a little hard to pirouette in chains, I imagine.

Mom waits for the door to close before she hands me a change of clothes. A 'thank you' was lingering on my lips, and I almost let it go too, until I slip mom's blue sequined tube-top out of the bag. The thing practically hemorrhages sparkles. It cuts off right around the navel. I like crop tops, just not in winter. Mom's tight skinny jeans, the one with the tears in all the wrong places, is beneath it. Following that is her favorite jacket. It too is crop cut, so I'll expect my midriff to freeze. It's the furriest thing I'd ever seen, black and puffy all the way around. Wearing this will surely make me feel like a cracked out movie star.

"Oh, and I got you these." she says, rooting around her cheetah-print Dolce & Gabbana purse. "I mean, you can't go out wearing that outfit and your school shoes, so…"

She pulls out a pair of twiggy high heels. The platforms are a light wooden color while the straps are about as blue as the tube-top. I'm not really sure if she went out and bought those just for me, or if she honestly has no clue what I like to wear. The look in her eyes tells me she's a little disappointed she's giving them to me, but we're basically the same size in everything so she's not all upset or anything. She'll probably just steal them out of my room on her way to work or something. It usually works that way.

"It's a present. You know… 'cause I know you've been under a lot of stress." - or she's just trying to buy an apology from me because of the other morning- "Aren't they cute?"

I know she's trying to help- _really, I do!_- but I can't believe I'm actually debating between wearing Angeline's blood all day or looking like a hooker. She wants to be a good mom. But I don't know if she could ever be one of those Disney channel mom's. It's just not in her. And who am I to tell her not to be herself when I get mad at her for pushing stuff on me?

"Yeah. Th-thanks, mom." and then I slip, or more like wrestle, myself into her tight clothes.

In the car, I get the call that Madame Thibeault has cancelled rehearsal for the day. Can't say I'm surprised by that, but it leaves me tense and sore from trying to bite off the tension. It's really the one thing that could take my mind off of that gory image in the bathroom- off Angeline. Ballet keeps me focused. It's my home away from home, and a sanctuary even with the gossiping girls and fights over not having enough space in the dressing room mirrors. It beats being home, with or without mom. But even more so, opening night is only a few days away and still we have so much to do. The costumes need tailoring, the lights need arranging, the props need mending, the backdrops need painting, the cues need sequencing. And now with Angeline's death, Madame has to change everything from Angeline's headlining name to my dim, silent one.

Now it's up to me to be Sekherta. Now it's my name on the program, my picture on the poster, me who the audience will pay most attention to. This is all I've dreamed of, and so far it's a nightmare. I've wanted to be Sekherta for so long, and now that my face is swelled by tears that sting, now that I'm howling the cries I should have heard in Angeline's eyes, I want every tutu, every tiara, every damned pointe shoe and stage to burn with my dreams.

* * *

><p>Yugi is sitting on the steps to my front porch as mom pulls into the driveway. She doesn't notice, but Yugi quickly closes his mouth like he'd just been in conversation. And I know with who. I've not wanted to see anyone so much as I do him. I've never been so thankful for his kind heart that always put others first, so that he came here. I need him more than he knows. And now I just want to run to him and burry myself in his arms so I can cry away the sight of Angeline's butchered throat, the detectives' faces, the bleakness of this winter's day.<p>

I'm not sure if it's these clothes or his smile, but as soon as he looks at me, there is hardly any oxygen going to my brain. I forget everything I was planning on talking to him about. Ok; _Angeline, death. Yami. Have to talk to Yami_. _I'll ask Yugi if I can talk to him really quick, hopefully he won't mind. I don't think he will, unless he's secretly jealous. Oh my gosh, he is so cute. No! Angeline. Sekherta. There must be a connection. A spiritual one. Do I believe in the curse? Yami would know, Yami would…_

I almost stumble in the shoes getting out of the car. _There goes my planning again! _Almost falling flat on my face makes me blush even harder, and there is nothing I can think of except _not_ doing that again. I just have to make it to my front door alive. That's my only goal right now.

"Hi, Mrs. Gardner. Hi, Tea." Yugi waves. That does it. His voice, his smile- it makes my knees go weak! With an ugly yelp, I end up face to face with the sky, supine on the walkway to my house. I swear, if one of my boobs has popped out of this top, I just might die!

Mom and Yugi make their way into my gaze. I don't want to move. I don't want to look at either of them. Maybe I can pretend I've hit my head so hard that I don't remember who they are or where I am. I can pretend I don't remember Angeline or her bleeding in my arms.

"Tea, are you ok?" Yugi lifts my head off the ground.

"What's the matter, boo?" mom pops her gum, as concerned for my well being as ever, "You act like you've never worn heels before."

Platforms and wedges? Yes. High, high, _high_ heels? No. Never. And this is exactly why.

I'm helped up by Yugi, which I'm sure is more than awkward for him. Of course I'm taller than him, I've always been even when we were little, but in these shoes I feel like a giant beside him.

Mom unlocks the door and I just can't wait to get inside. I've never been so happy about taking my shoes off, and this time I'm thinking about leaving them outside for good. You know, like, six feet under. But I don't suppose I could do that to mom _or _her wallet. My Norwegian forest cat, Kuriboh, meows at our arrival louder than ever. He comes up and starts rubbing against Yugi's legs before we can even get everybody through the door.

"Aw, he missed you." I laugh. It feels good to know that I remember how to do that.

"Hey, Kuriboh. I missed you too!" he picks the fat fluff up and lets him lick his nose. All the while, mom is banging every cabinet door for something to heat up. This woman does not cook.

"Oh, by the way." says Yugi, placing the cat back down on the wood floor. "I, uh, brought you these. I thought they'd make you feel better, after… well… you know."

He reaches for his back pocket and pulls out a small, but marvelous display of flowers. The bouquet is filled with all sorts of colors and shapes, like a delicate, smooth rainbow. Just how I like them. I love all flowers, and Yugi knows that best. I can't just pick one favorite like roses or lilies or orchids. Any kind is really my favorite. The name isn't Tea _Gardner _for nothing.

"Oh, Yugi! Thank you so much! These are wonderful. And they sure do the job. I feel better already."

And then I think he's about to say something cool. Something really, _really _cool. Like, romantic cool, and then we'd kiss! _That _kind of cool. But I'll never know for sure now, because mom wings around the counter top and walks over into the living room, muttering some curses, and says;

"Boo, I'm gonna run out to do some grocery shopping. You think you'll be ok?"

"Yeah. I have Yugi to keep me company, and Kuriboh to attack anybody who tries to hurt us!"

Mom doesn't find any of my childish humor… humorous. Like so many other of my classmates, if the joke isn't sexual or insulting, it's not very funny. Why I do even bother?

But I don't like the way she ogles Yugi, and then me, the flowers in my hand, and then what little space there is between him and I. Then she smiles proudly and deviously.

"'Kay. Just remember, the safeties are in the drawer beside my bed."

Oh no. She did not. I don't want to believe that she just said _safeties, _and in front of Yugi. It's our code word for condoms. She made it up for me when I was, like, eleven or something when we had "the talk". I am at least a little relieved when I see that Yugi is more involved with Kuriboh than me. Or maybe he's just pretending. Either way, it really helps. He always seems to know what do to do. How to make me feel better. But, I mean, as the king of games and the guy that solved the almost-impossible Millennium Puzzle, I'm sure that meager mother-daughter codes aren't all that difficult for him to figure out.

"Mom!" I yell louder than I would like to. It takes Yugi away from Kuriboh for a second.

"What? I'm just saying that comfort sex-"

"Bye, mom!" I shove her out the door.

I still hear her yell, although with a laugh, outside. "You're almost seventeen, Tea, you might want to _get on that_!"

"And you're almost to the car, mom, you might want to _get in it_!"

I listen for her heels to click-clack all the way down the walkway and then for the car to start.

"What was that all about?" Yugi tilts his head.

With a blush, I just laugh. Like, really laugh. I don't know how I can laugh after all that's happened, but it vomits from my mouth, making me even more embarrassed and nauseous than mom implying I have comfort sex with Yugi.

I suddenly get serious.

"C'mon. We have to talk."

If he's not totally weirded out by my bipolar-ness, I totally am freaking out about how I'm supposed to word this all. How do I even begin what I plan on saying? _"Hey, you're great, but can I talk to the _other_ you? Yeah, you know the one. By the way, thanks for being a great friend and giving me flowers and coming over to make sure I was ok." _

I know I would feel pretty hurt if I were in Yugi's position. I mean, Joey's been trying to hint to me that Yugi likes me. And I like him too! A lot! He's fun and supportive, and über nice. But what about Yami? He's so hot, always so cocksure of himself and still so chivalric. I would follow his lead any day. I would listen to anything he had to say. I would lose myself in those eyes. They weren't childish and optimistic like Yugi's, they were serious and daring. Yugi really _is _the best of both worlds, as long as you pretend there aren't two spirits inside him. But I know I could never do that.

Why do I have to be such a girl?

We enter my bedroom. He's only been in here a few times, but that was back when I had him and a whole bunch of my other friends over for parties when we were little. It's a nice change though from our usual hang outs, like his place or the museum.

He takes a moment to observe all my posters of ballerinas and gymnasts. Svetlana Zakharova and her partner Roberto Bolle in _La Fille Du Pharaon_, Tamara Rojo, Vladimir Schklyarov, Brigitte Zehr, and all my favorite figure skaters as well. He notes at all the makeup I have on my vanity and all the accessories dangling around my mirror. I have too many shoes for them all to fit in my closet, so many of them clutter the floor. My bed isn't made, and the room smells like hairspray and _Victoria's Secret _perfume. There's not a thing about Duel Monsters, except my own deck that I keep beside my picture of us, Joey, Tristan, and Serenity. It's always on my nightstand, right beside my bed. Intentionally.

He's obviously out of his element. It's written all on his face. But, then, I realize that it's not _his_ face that stares so awkwardly at all the girly trinkets.

"Pharaoh?" I ask, although it's not a question. "When did you…"

"On the way up the stairs. Yugi and I figured that you'd probably want to discuss what's been happening lately. You probably have a lot of questions. Questions you think I can answer."

"No, you, he…ugh. How do you two know me so well?"

"What are friends for?"

_Oh gosh. He said friends. Just friend. Well, we are… right now. But what if it's because Yugi's listening? Oh my God, this is not what I wanted to talk about. Focus, Tea! Just don't think about how sexy he looks right now even though he's totally the blue elephant in my pink, pink room. Even his awkward-ness is so cute! Eee! No, don't think about that! Or how those eyes, those arms… no!_

"Angeline." I blurt out. "What happened today was just so… I was so scared. Yami, something is wrong. Very, very wrong. And I know you feel it too."

He nods. "Yes. Yugi and I both have noticed a strange feeling surrounding your ballet. Do you remember the day you invited Yugi to your rehearsal?"

"Yeah."

"While you danced, Yugi and I switched places. But not on purpose. Something drew me out of the Millennium Puzzle that day. I haven't felt it again until this morning."

"What do you mean 'drew you out'?"

"Something pulled me. I had no control over it. Nor did Yugi."

"Like… a person?"

"I can't say. It felt more like a need. Like a magnetizing feeling rather than an actual being. I would like to believe I would have seen a spirit if there were one."

"Yami… I'm frightened. Weird things have been happening to me as well."

"Like?"

"Like the day Angeline went to the hospital. I tried so hard to fall asleep, but all night I felt like something was keeping me awake as if I had to wait and anticipate what would happen to Angeline. Then we got to the hospital, which is when I knew you could feel it too, and… on the way back, I could have sworn there was someone in the backseat of the car. My mom saw it too! I know she did, but she wouldn't ever admit to something like that. And then… the other day, I was somehow let into the theatre. All the doors were locked except for one when a dry, eerie breeze blew. I don't know how to explain it."

I don't dare tell him what happened next. Firstly, I still don't even know how to encapsulate it. The orchestra _was_ there, but then again, they weren't. I'm still not entirely sure that all happened. But it must have. Madame Thibeault saw me. That's why… I'm Sekherta now.

"Has Angeline's attacker been found?" he asks, as if sensing my wanting to move away from my experiences.

"No. The detectives… they suspects me. They haven't voiced it yet, but I know they do. I mean, Angeline pointed me out in the hospital _and_ I was the only one around when she died. As of right now, all I can do is wait for the forensic evidence to prove that I didn't kill her. I wouldn't. _That's not me_!" a tear traces its way down my cheek.

No. Not now. I can't cry now. Not in front of Yami, who usually thinks I am so strong and willed.

"You believe me, right? Please, Pharaoh…" and I can't hold the tears in any more. I held back in the car, I held back while detectives were prying Angeline's body from my arms, but I wouldn't hold back now.

"I can't deal with this! I have school, and work, and the ballet is only a few days away, and my mom… oh!" my sobs are struck with sharp breaths. I'm sure so much of what I'm saying doesn't even sound like words to Yami. But he strides up to me anyways, reaching for my shoulders, and holding me up for the little boost I need. His touch is like magic. Sparks sizzle away beneath his warm touch and I can't control myself. More and more tears come running down my face. I must look like such a baby.

"Oh, it was horrible. It was horrible! Angeline." her name sounds like an owl screeching consonants and syllables down my throat. "There was blood everywhere. I had no idea what she was saying, I was so scared. I don't know what to do, Pharaoh. I… I don't know anymore. I wish I could pretend this never happened. I could have stopped her! If I had just opened that door sooner, if I had run down that hall faster, if I hadn't been so jealous of her! She's dead now, and I could have stopped her, Pharaoh, and then she'd still be alive! This is all my fault."

He pulls me closer to him. This time his arms travel further down my body to my waist where he tugs me. He lets me cry there in his chest for a little while. I don't know how long we're like this; him just gently rocking me and telling it's going to be ok. It's not my fault, he says. It's not my fault. But deep down, I know it is. I just do. His voice is the most sultry whisper I ever did hear. It lulls me until I have no more tears to irrigate down my cheeks. He just holds me until all my cowardly, shameful wails are nothing but pathetic little sniffles and breaths of air.

The Millennium Puzzle. It's the first thing my eyes focus on as they clear from crying. It's what Angeline had been staring at when Yugi came to my aid as she had me pinned against the lockers. It changed her mood from horrifyingly aggressive to horrifyingly pensive. She was amused by it even. But, not without the 'horrifyingly' part either. She wanted it. I'm sure of it now, because that's all my eyes will feast at.

My heart throbs in my head. Yami's- _Yugi's?_-heart throbs against my ear. They're out of sync. His is so gentle and so reassuring. Mine is wild, and with an echo of something malignant. The golden eye stares back, taunts me even. And the second I touch it, even with only the tip of my finger as though I am girlishly toying with it, all I want is to rip the chains from his neck and chuck this thing. But that's not me. Why would I want to do that? Anger. Hate. Malice. They burn through me like wildfire. I'm sure it has every nook and cranny of my body, but still it feels like there's more of me set alight.

I am furious. My heart races against Yami's. I think it may just burst. I take even more of the puzzle into my hands greedily, not caring if Yami notices. All at once, I am overwhelmed by the sounds of screams. There's more than one woman, a few men on the side. Somewhere I think there are words between them. Words of another tongue, but they can only be panicked pleas and desperate discourses by the sounds of them. I want to kill. Just like I wanted to kill Brett Banson. I want to kill. I want to kill. I want to kill. I want someone to scream and beg for the life I won't let them keep. I want someone to shutter and writhe beneath my hands.

"Tea?" Yami lifts me slightly from him. It's enough to put some distance between the artifact and I. And all the noise goes away. My heart steadies, thanking him for his timing.

"Are you alright?"

I nod. "Y-Yes. Thank you, Pharaoh."

He only smiles. Only part of it is to comfort me. The other part tries to mask that he doesn't completely believe me. Could he sense what I was just feeling? I really, really hope not.

I look back at this Millennium Puzzle. The golden eye still stares back, and I wonder; what other horrors has that eye seen?

**End Chapter**


	8. Act 2, Scene 3: Dance of Denial

Act II, Scene III

There is nothing I like about the feelings that had just coursed through me. Even though Yami had retreated back into the puzzle, and mom had managed to operate the microwave, eating Pizza Bites and watching movies with Yugi doesn't coax the dread that whimpers behind my heart. This should be the perfect distraction from the hell my life has seeped into. But it's not working. I have my best friend and both my crushes snuggled right beside me on my living room couch, and mom hasn't said anything else embarrassing. So why do I feel so miserable?

I'm disgusted. I know I'm hungry- I haven't eaten since that pathetic bagel last night- but my stomach churns, denying me comfort in the food I'm trying feed it. I was excited just moments ago when mom pulled the Pizza Bites from the microwave. The smell of them sent my stomach cheering, leading my and Yugi's way back downstairs. But now I can hardly pick up the scent. All I can smell is damp earth and blood. After Angeline, I don't think I'll ever forget the odor; the acrid and almost rainy scent of a kill.

Still, I know it's more than that. It's the feeling I can't shake off; a feeling I hate. It's the same engraved emotion I felt when I was balling my eyes out in Yami's arms, glaring spitefully- as I am now- at the Millennium Puzzle. Perhaps it's the way the gold pyramid flints light like Angeline would command attention at ballet rehearsals. Maybe it's because it's so bulky and it parts Yugi and I. But I loathe it. No; I _want_ to loathe it. Even just the thought of it. I want to hate it so burningly, so wrongly. I want it out of my house. Yami can stay, of course, but that thing needs to go. _Now_. I've never felt this way, so any aggression I have for this artifact is easily backed by confusion and fear. The Millennium Puzzle has never bothered me- except maybe this one time when I went to hug Yugi and the thing jabbed me pretty good in the ribs, but no more than that.

It's giving me some serious bad vibes. I just can't feel comfortable in my own home with it here, and so close to me too. The sudden darkness in the room is disturbed by it too. I think everything is in mist. The sights, the sounds. Everything is hazy and glassed over. I knew it was getting late, of course, but when had it gotten so dark in here? Mom is still on the computer, she wouldn't turn the lights off yet. Have we really been sitting here all through the sunset?

Lifting a mini pizza to my lips seems impossible for the moment. I have to eat. I have to. It takes so much work to do even that simple task, and I suppose for good reason. The sauce squeezes into my mouth, rolling under my tongue and snaking between my teeth. It tastes like blood. It _feels_ like blood. It has to be all in my head. But no matter how much I will myself to believe that, I can't _not _gag at the sensation it leaves. It starts to thicken around my gums and dries there. Nausea grabs a hold of me then. _I can't puke- not now_! Not when Yugi and I are so close, so…

It doesn't matter. I'm already throwing myself over the edge of the sofa, disgorging every chunk of nothing I've eaten today. I don't think vomiting has ever hurt so much. Probably because all the other times I've been sick, there was food to remove from my system. Now I was running on what few bites of pizza I've hardly swallowed. All that comes out is acid. Acid and blood.

"Mrs. Gardner!" Yugi warns my mother. He's at my side, not quite sure what do with himself. He tries rubbing my back but he knows it doesn't do much for me. I just want to stop puking. Stop burning. There is nothing left of me to regurgitate, but still my body heaves and surges to continue spewing my emptiness. My gags mutate in something resembling the shouts of a cougar. _'Cause that's real attractive_. I'm hardly given any time to breath between bouts.

"Get it all out, T." says mom, bringing over a mop bucket. _It's even more surprising that she knows where the cleaning supplies is. _"Come on. Good girl. Get it all out."

And I finally think I'm done. My brain gets the memo that there is nothing down in my stomach but vacancy signs. I wait a moment, my body cringing not only from the bitterness, but from the embarrassment as well. Mom shuts off the TV and pushes the coffee table out of the way.

"I'll get this mess. Yugi? Help her to her room, would you, doll?"

"Of course. Come on, Tea."

He tugs gently on my arm, like a child that's hesitant to use all their strength to nudge their parents. I don't want to move, though. I want to keep my head down where no one can see my face. My cheeks burn red from shaking against the rising liquids in my throat. Tears swell from the pressure. I'm sure they're red too. Eventually I give in. He's doing all he can to help me and I'm just making things harder for him by demanding I remain like this, perched over the aroma of my acidic spews. I lift my head first.

Someone stands behind the sofa. Behind me. In the reflection of the TV screen, there's no way I can mistake it. I know it's not the reflection of the hallway, because I can see that; the rectangular outline of the doorway and the stairs hazily mixed into the masses of grays and blacks. No. Even closer to me is the shape of a person- a woman. Her curves are undeniable in what appears to be a white dress of some sort. It folds over her body like the fabric is simply strands of cloud. Her hair is thick and black, expanding the appearance of her total head. I think those are beads entwined in it. I think. Not quite sure. But she stares back with a face I've yet to make out. Maybe I don't want to.

I jump to my feet, just nearly dodging the puddle I've made so unwillingly, and make sure I turn to this figure. Yet no one is there to return my look. The first thing I grasp is the lamp just askew from where I had seen this woman. The shade is black, the post is white. I need to believe that that's what I was seeing. I _really need_ to believe that right now, or else I just my hurl again. I believe in the spirits of Ancient Egyptian Pharaohs being locked away in thousand year old gold, but I do not believe in their wives coming back to haunt, and possibly kill people. I do not believe in haunted ballets or paranormal roles. Especially when I could be the next victim.

All the way up the stairs, this is my mantra. I say it again and again. I do not believe in spirit's the way I do Yami. He's… he's different. That's all. I do not believe that that apparition and all the nonsensical happenings before now are caused by a curse; by Sekherta. She's just a made-up character. The story of _The Sands of Solipsism _being found in actual hieroglyphics is just a rumor. A plausible rumor, but a nimble conjecture nonetheless. It's not true. It can't be.

I just don't want to believe that. Because in doing so, that would mean that I believe that Sekherta is with me now, watching and waiting, flowering darkness into every fearful nook of my being. And if I'm to make it to opening night, through the days to come even, I can't allow myself to believe that.

Yugi helps me into my room where he turns away so I can change out of my mom's "casual" clothes. Her jeans have left pink indents all along my waist line, and as a ballet dancer, it has me a little worried. I'm not sure of the last time I weighed myself- and I don't think I want to. Maybe I should lay off all the pizza. If I bulk up before opening night, I can say goodbye to the lead role I've only dreamed of since I was little. As if I need to be worrying about that on top of everything else.

"You can look now." I finish changing. He really is a gentleman. Joey or Tristan would have stolen a glance, maybe have even teased me about it. But not Yugi.

"You should really rest." he says. "Besides, I should probably get going. I promised Grandpa I'd help him with the packages."

"New cards?"

"New everything."

"Oh. Cool." and then I wait a moment. I want to ask him to stay. Don't leave me alone just yet. But the words aren't in me. I'd feel selfish for asking it after all he's done for me. "Say, Yugi. Can I ask you something?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Have you… noticed anything strange? I mean, other than the obvious. Like, right now. Do you…"

"Can't say I do. Not right now. Why, do you?"

"N-No."

"iI's this new role, isn't it? It seems to really have you on edge."

"I guess. I've never had the principal role before. And now… I'm just so stressed out. I think that's why I got sick before. Sorry about that."

"It's fine. I understand. Sometimes I get really nervous before a duel too."

_But it's not the same_, I want to say. _You duel for justice, for others. To save your friends. To save _me_. I was just selfish for wanting this role, for wanting to leave the corps and enter the spotlight. What does being lead role do for anyone other than myself? Did it kill Angeline? Was I wrong for dreaming that I could be Sekherta?_

"Thanks." is all that will come out of my mouth. I want Yugi to know how I'm feeling, what I'm worried about. But how do I do that without dumping it all on him? Like; _here you go, Yugi, lots and lots of honesty. Now solve my problems for me, will you? _I could never do that to him. And besides, this doesn't seem like the kind of problem we can solve with a card game. If only, though… if only.

We hardly talk much more after that, and just a few minutes after, he's gone. But so is the darkness. So are the enigmatic plagues and the apparitions. I'm beginning to wonder if this curse- if, you know, I believe in that- is truly connected to the Millennium Puzzle. To Yami. Is Sekherta an old wife of his? Did he even have a wife? Whatever it is, I have to find out.

* * *

><p>"Again!" shouts Madame Thibeault. The loss of Angeline has elongated her wrinkles and whitened her hair. She looks older than ever. Angeline's death has taken its toll on everyone, it seems. The whole company, even the stage, appears sordid and distraught. And knowing that opening night is only a few rehearsals away is setting aflame more than one person's attitude here.<p>

We are all pedantic in our learning. Everything is quick, do-or-die. If you don't understand something, you better ask someone first thing the next morning because no one is slowing down for you. We're sweating in our grace. We're hurting in our smiles. It doesn't matter.

"No. Again." Madame tugs me off center stage with her false nails peeling the skin on my arm. "Hayden, you must lift her higher. This is the coronation scene, God dammit! You're holding her up as if you're just like; 'hey guys, this is Sekherta. She's the new queen of Egypt. Blah, blah.' No! You must raise her high. You are Pharaoh and you are making a statement. You have just appointed her your queen. Make everyone listen, heed your commands! Ugh!"

The music starts again. It's about the billionth time today I've heard the intro to Act three's scene one; the coronation scene. It's supposed to be when the Pharaoh, having been seduced by Sekherta, announces her as Queen of Egypt in front of everyone in his royal court. But right now it looks like we're all just trying to get through the day. I watch as Hayden, in all his soreness, manages to float over the stage as though he doesn't feel a bit of strain. Dancers posing as priests and nobles are seated upstage, just before the nearly completed backdrop of our Ancient Egyptian throne room. Each one of them looks around to remember exactly where their spots are and making sure to stay out of Hayden's way. Madame Thibeault may just have their heads mounted on her office walls if they do.

Summer stands stage right in her beat up old leotard and leg warmers. She's just glad Madame isn't focusing on her as she pretends to be a sad and sorrowful Kemat. The girls who dance Pharaoh's other wives come leaping out onto the stage from out of the stage wings. They're all Angeline's friends. Or, rather, her clique. They're all faces I know I've seen, but have never talked to. And they're all disgusted by me having Angeline's spot.

Madame Thibeault gives me a shove when I just nearly miss my cue. It's not my most graceful entrance, but hardly the worst. I stumble out onto the stage, but Hayden steadies me into motion when he grabs my hands. Right now, all that matters is not tripping up, and pretending that I want Hayden to marry me right now, right on this very stage. So I pretend it's Yugi's face looking back at me, because there is no way I could look back at Hayden without seeing his love for a girl whose best friend just died. I'd like to think that they're both really just getting into their characters, but Summer watches me to make sure I'm not making a move on her crush. _As if_!

When I open my eyes to trumpets and conniving strings, it's Yami I'm imagining and not Yugi. My _real _pharaoh dances with me. And Hayden has drifted off into some reality I don't want to be a part of. The reality where Angeline is dead and her friends are all around me with accusations and slander. But here, it's just like we're in the world of his memory. His other wives dance around us yet we hardly notice them. Summer still stares and waits for Yami's eyes to fall upon her. She hopes that somehow he will remember a love for her, but he is all mine. I have him roped by my arms. Our eyes never leave each other's for too long.

_Here comes the lift._

The music crescendos. The spotlight is on us. With a cymbal crash, I am hoisted above the rest of the world. It is to say that I am his queen. Everyone must now obey me. It's the sweetest taste of forever as I am spun gently around with his hands coveting my waist. I stare up into the rows of battens that are hidden from the audience by the teaser curtain. I can't quite understand why I'm so distracted by the wires and lights, the beams the stage crew must stealthily trod across during our performances. But I don't want to look anywhere else.

I remember one time when Angeline made out with a guy up there. It was during our performance of _A Midsummer Night's Dream_, before she had to go on stage. Being that it was the third show of the night, she was probably just about ready to pack it up anyways. I was dancing in the corps, as usual, when I spotted her. They were trying so hard to quite their sultry giggles. The boy's hands slipped under her costume and between her legs. She threw her head back and laughed, practically thrusting herself onto his fingers. She combed through his mess of hair. I thought I would have been rained on by their wet kisses. But then she looked down at me as soon as I made my way off stage. Her look said it all, and I never told anyone about it. She'd have been kicked out of the company.

I can almost hear that laugh now. Pleasurable, flowing chortles from the battens above. And now all I want is to get down. I want to place my feet on the stage, come back to earth. Now I wasn't being held up in praise, I was being lifted up as a sacrifice.

"Put me down!" I squirm. "Hayden, let go! Put me down!"

"What the hell, Tea!" he refuses to let go. But my struggles weigh down his arms and he has no choice but to shove me to the stage floor. Madame Thibeault is just about to storm over, her face is already red with fumes. I've just ruined what could have been a perfect sequence. Everything was going smoothly until I decided to cower. But when I shove myself and Hayden out of center stage and one of the stage lights comes crashing down where we would have stood, she freezes.

Everyone jumps. Their shouts and shrieks are no match for the sound of the bulb smashing into pieces and the metal case careening to the floor. We all leap away, afraid that one of the glass shards will strike our ankles.

_That could have been me_.

"Merdre!" Madame swears. "Everyone ok?"

She takes a look about the stage. Most of us are huddled in the wings, shocked by the noise and how close Hayden and I have just come to death. While Madame Thibeault investigates, Hayden is pulling me closer than ever. His heart is beating fast.

"Shit." he repeats a couple of times. "Damn it. That could have been us."

"Yeah." is all I can say.

"I should have put you down quicker. Sorry I didn't believe you."

"It's fine. We're safe now." Well, _he_ is. I'm not so sure of myself.

Even Bert, the stage director, has come to investigate. They all look at the shattered mess and then back up at the ceiling. They ask the same questions over and over again; is anyone hurt, what happened, if anyone had noticed something before.

"Qu'est-ce qui s'est passé?" Madame Thibeault, still torn that this has interfered with rehearsals, assibilates to the stage crew.

"It probably wasn't fastened properly." says one of the men with about as much concern for the matter as my mom is concerned about me going out and drinking with strangers. _Not at all_.

"Not fastened properly? _Not fastened properly_? Excuse me, sir, I have dancers on this stage almost all day everyday, and you're telling me the lights above them that could fall and kill them like they almost just did are not fastened properly? I don't think so. Clean this up. And when you're done, I want you to check every single light in this entire theatre so this" - she points to the broken light case and the ring of glass shards- "does not happen again!"

She then turns her attention to all of us dancers just watching in the wings.

"Everyone, get a drink. Meet me back in the Green Room in ten, we are taking notes."

No one even thinks about staying to watch Madame Thibeault's tirade continue. Hardly anyone will understand her French anyways, but even the words we can't comprehend would cut like the glass that's strewn about the stage.

In the hallways, though, and even in the dressing rooms, there isn't a single friendly face. They all talk in hushed tones that turn hissy and cruel the moment I walk past. I know they're all whispering about me. And it's not '_o-m-g, she almost died_', it's '_o-m-g, why _didn't _she die?_'

Not even Summer will have me for company. I really need to talk to her about Angeline. She might know something more about the 'spirit' thing, like when and where did she started mentioning the strange things happening to her. No one would know Angeline better than Summer. But she'll have none of it. She's leaned against the wall in one of the hallways, surrounded by her fellow Angeline mourners and clique. All the girls that play the Pharaoh's wives were Angeline's friends, and all of them with the same prissy smirks and high cheek bones that radiate arrogance.

They're like a pack of wolves that have lost their alpha. Angeline used to be the star of the company, the prima-donna who didn't have to show up to Company Class like the rest of us, the bossy beam of perfection that no one could say no to. Not even Madame Thibeault. Most of us dancers in the corps emulated her. But not I. I always used to think that when I had a principal role like Angeline, I would be nothing like her. I guess I wasn't wrong there. Because even though I'm supposedly the new star of the show, no one cares. No one praises me.

And it's because I'm not Angeline. I'm not that confident or that bitchy. I figure being a bitch can be a positive sometimes. It got Angeline what she wanted, and it got her respect too. The ballet company is an autocracy and she used to rule it. Would I ever be able to fill her throne, her pointe shoes? Do I even want to?

"Summer," I try for her attention. She glares at me, folds her arms over her chest, and huffs a strand of her red hair from her face. "Please, I need to talk to you."

"About how you killed her friend?" snaps one of the other girls.

"I didn't kill Angeline! Do you honestly believe the police would have let me go if I did?"

"There's just not enough evidence to convict you yet. We know you did it. You were the only one there when she died. You were always jealous of her. I bet you had something to do with the light falling too. Wanted to kill Hayden too? Maybe Summer next? So you'll take her off to a private room for a 'talk', where you'll finish the job."

"You make no sense. If I wanted the light to fall on Hayden, why did I pull him out of the way when I could have just saved myself?"

"How should I know? I'm not a murderer."

"Nor am I. Look, I don't have time for you. I need to talk to Summer."

"Well, boo-hoo. She doesn't want to talk to you right now."

"Or ever." comes another girl.

"Just go away. You have Angeline's role, and one of our closest friends is dead. Aren't you satisfied yet?"

I don't know what's come over me, but I have my hands digging into this girl's shoulders before I know what I'm doing. Shoving her up against the wall is strangely exhilarating. It's just as Angeline had done to me against the lockers at school. It feels so terribly good. I feel… powerful.

"I haven't killed _anyone_!" I shout loud enough to shake her more than her bony figure hitting the plaster does. "But… I _could_ start with you."

She gulps.

"Ok, ok," a blonde girl finally approaches me. She places a quivering hand atop my shoulder and I feel the need to reach out and choke her. Have her pinned against this wall beside her friend. The touch of another human is so foreign. Her hand is so timid and full of pulsing, throbbing life, that it wakes me.

"Please. We're sorry. We're all just upset about Angeline. We miss her so much, you know? Please, Tea, let her go."

I look back at the girl I have pinned. There's a fear in her that I didn't think I could cause. She's truly terrified and I let go, but I don't move my feet. She checks my expression to see if I'll strike again before she slips away from me. All the girls huddle together and walk away with quick steps. Summer follows them but I managed to swipe her wrist.

"Summer."

She just shakes her head.

"I can't watch the same thing happen to you." she whimpers almost inaudibly. The warmth of her being leaves my hand and she skitters away with her friends down the hall. None of them look back at me, but I know they want to. They whisper again, yet not with cruelty or with sharp tongues. But with fear.

* * *

><p>I sit alone, hunched over my laptop while my feet are soaking in a bucket of ice. After years of ballet, and even hip-hop classes, you get used to the feeling of shoving your ligaments into ice water. It's not so much a discomfort as it is annoying to have to repeat.<p>

Mom is out working again, and it's too late for my friends to be over. As much as my mom wouldn't mind them being here, I'm sure their folks would be. The tabs open on my browser are all related to _The Sands of Solipsism_; searches on its origin, Youtube videos of past performances, and bios on past dancers who had the principal role.

I've watched so many of these videos that it's hard for me to comprehend how I've missed anything. Still, it doesn't hurt to brush up on my ballet studies. The dancers are just as elegant as I've always seen them. To a viewer like me, it doesn't appear than any of them could have been dealing with the same things I am. They're perfect. They're hypnotizing. They're… maybe that's it- _they're perfect_. And I'm not just saying in their moves, but in their expressions. It's quite possible that what everyone perceives as just really good acting, is them truly feeling the hurt and the struggle of Sekherta's story. Maybe I'm just reading too much into it too.

In the other tab, it says that Svetlana Zakharova and Yuan Yuan Tan are still going strong in their ballet careers. Which is excellent, because no career in dance lasts long. I've already prepared a back-up plan for myself (should I ever make it big). Still, during their performances of _The Sands of Solipsism_, they never finished the show. The clips I saw of them were only dress rehearsals it seems, and they both demanded that the show be cancelled. They said it was for medical reasons. I guess as Prima Ballerinas, you're allowed to do that and no one can disagree. Angeline would have made a perfect Prima Ballerina. But for Josephine Pena and Fantasme Dvorzhetski, it's a different story.


	9. Act 2, Scene 4: Replacement

Act II, Scene IV

The rooftop, in all the theatre's entirety, is the only place where reality exists here. The stage is a home away from home for many of us dancers. Inside, everything is a fantasy. Everything is dramatic, artistic, and choreographed. It can be a sick, sore, and heartbreaking fantasy at times, but there is always a reward when we take our bows. There's forests of tulle and ribbons. There's a fog of hairspray, sweat, and the custodian's chemical remedies for the floor. We act out stories that are not our own. We dance for strangers hidden in the dark seas past the stage floor. We act as people, as characters, who are not us, who are only real under the light of the stage.

Outside, however, there's the first snow of winter. I am alone up here on the roof of the theatre. The girls who smoke usually come up here for a puff, but it's too cold for them tonight it seems. So, despite all, I've met my refuge. Clearly it's been a while since we've last spent time together; my solitude and I. There's holiday decorations streamed along the street wires below me, even between traffic lights, and down telephone poles. Children point into every toy, game, and candy shop. I think about Yugi's grandpa and how busy he must be around this time of year. Thank goodness he has Yugi to help him around the shop. The poor old man. Adults hail cabs and juggle shopping bags when they're no chattering into their phones. Teens, even some I've seen walking down the halls of my school, head off to enjoy a normal life with their friends. Their breaths condensate into lively clouds amongst the ripe winter's air.

Sometimes, when you're a dancer, you forget there's a world outside the studios and the theatres. You forget that trees and buildings are three-dimensional, not painted onto backdrops of the stage. You forget there are stars that actually twinkle in place of rows of lights that beam at soloists and focal points. And maybe that's how it's supposed to be. Maybe there's a reason there are so few windows in the theatre. They want to lock you up in here, starve you of reality until there is none. So, then, you can live your dance and only your dance. You can live for the stage, feasting only on diet cokes, apple slices, and pretzels from the vending machines. If you hide in your make-up and burrow yourself deep enough into tutus and flashy bodices, the world can be starved of you as well… until _you _are none.

At least out here I can be someone other than just a face in the corps, a bony body in a tutu. I can think now. Even though I'm not entirely sure that's something I want to do. I mean, do I want to simmer in my thoughts? Do I want to think about what's been happening? Do I want to accept the facts, accept what happened to all the dancers who played Sekherta? Is running from reality why I even decided to do ballet professionally in the first place?

I pull my scarf up when a breeze blows. I just want to stay here forever; forget about spirits and ancient artifacts, forget about counts to a dance sequence and measurements for costumes. I throw myself back to look completely up at the sky. I don't care about how wet my hair will look or how soaked my coat will be. I just want the snow to sprinkle down on me. Bury me.

"They died." I said aloud to myself. "The dancers… died. Only three who had the role of Sekherta ever survived after the ballet, and only because they quit. That's not an option for me though. If I quit, Madame would… I don't even want to know. Only one person has ever even finished a performance of _The Sands of Solipsism_."

And it's true. The dancers I thought I saw in the videos had all died. They complained of chest pains and were rushed to the hospital half way through the performance. Alternates finished out the ballet for them, but weren't all that praised because of how little they knew the parts. I'd be nervous too if I were just suddenly thrown onto stage with the main role. The originals, the girls who'd been sent off to the emergency room, … they'd died. Heart attacks, gruesome suicides, "accidents", you name it. Svetlana Zakharova never went through with the ballet. Yuan Yuan Tan made her company cancel the performance. And Fantasme Dvorzhetski is the only one to have ever danced the ballet all the way through. She made it to the finale.

She's in an asylum a few hours drive from Domino.

"I have to see her." I say as if someone is listening. "If I'm to find a way to live, I have to talk to her."

I have been made Public Enemy #1 amongst the ballet company. I am the heavy metal amongst classical music, the black swan amongst white ones. As Sam, one of coordinators, leads me to my new dressing room, I feel like there's about to be a Kennedy-type assassination in this hallway. Sam is going on about keeping my vanity station clean, not being too much a bitch to the others girls since I'm new, and not to stick any gum under the tables.

* * *

><p>My new place is in Soloist Suite 2. Back in the corps, we'd all just used the locker room and then crowded in the bathroom mirrors for makeup and hair. But I have a main role- the main role- now, and so I'm forced to leave my girls in the corps behind. I'll miss chattering nonsensically with some of my corps friends like Rin Takaya, Crystal Que, and little Arianna Pesilkov. They were really the only company I had in the theatre, and we'd talk just about anything- from our nervous jitters before going on stage to how our non-sex lives are going. Now, I'm in a dressing room designed to hold the hyenas.<p>

And the worst part about it? I'm given Angeline's old station. It's right in the center of all the vanities lining the wall. A few petals remain on the wooden counter from what I assume were funerary flowers. Her place is ghostly now, and the kind of vacant where it's not just that no one is here, but that no one ever was. The custodians have been in here as there are no more lipsticks smudge or sticky hairspray residue. But I can still the smell a trace of her perfume. Vanilla and black raspberry. No one else wore it but her. If they did, she'd go off on them in her usual, bullying ways. I stand before the seat where Angeline sat, and look in the mirror that Angeline looked in. There's nothing I want with it. With any of it. Why couldn't I have just stayed where I was, shoving my way through a herd of girls to get my makeup on five minutes before curtains? Why here? Why Angeline's old vanity? Why surrounded by her mourning friends who still believe that I'm responsible for her death?

"And the bathroom is in the back." says Sam. "Mrs. Thibeault needs you ready in ten for costume fitting. Then you have your photo shoot in the principal studio."

"Photo shoot?"

"Yeah. They want to keep Angeline's photo on the cover of the programs out of respect, but you'll still need your photos taken for the honorable mentions and you know… since you're the main role and all."

"Oh. Right." I begin to unload my little make-up kit. Sam leaves me to my business. It tears me up inside that I have to do this; be at Angeline's station, using her space, her chair. My tears burn to come out, but can not permit them leave. This room would normally be bustling with crude humor and gossip if she were still here. Now it is dead silent. Shuffles from somewhere afar and some piano music from one of the studios hardly seep under the door. I set up my make up and hair products, beginning work on my face.

The make up for Sekherta is daring and loud. Make-up is more of my mother's area of expertise than my own, but luckily I had my ballet friends to help me fill in the blanks. I wish they were here now though to make sure I don't screw up a photo that is more important to me than a senior portrait. I rim my eyes deeply in black, elongating the ends. My eyelids are sun bathed in gold and glitter, my brow bone highlighted. The copper tone along my crease adds to the deep, seductive look of my eyes that I can honestly say I enjoy. Then come the false lashes. Arianna used to do this part for me, but now I'm on my own. I don't think they come out all too terrible. They look good to me. I load my brush, smothering my cheek bones with a light bronzer and some shimmering powder. And finally, I am done.

I look… like a queen. Not Sekherta, but a queen. A mighty sovereign with compassion and power. I've never been a huge fan of make-up, but I could get used to this. Maybe Yami could too? I sit back, trying to see if it's me beneath this beauty. A part of me is screaming with confidence; "of course it's me! I was pretty to begin with, but now I'm gorgeous!". Yet, another half of me says something else. Something I try to shove down into my gut again. "_Kill. Kill. Kill_."

Moments later, not hesitating in the least to leave Angeline's old vanity, Lottie- the head honcho of the costume department- is squashing me into a bodice I'm sure is so not my size. My ribs may just collapse in on themselves if she pulls any harder on this bodice that's clearly not in the mood to budge.

"Oh, Tea," she places a chubby finger to her chin, eyeing me up and down. "I was sure I had the right size. It's these… breasts, deary."

My face immediately reddens. I've always known my figure appeared bigger than most girls in the company because of my breasts. In fact, I'm sure I'm the only dancer here whose larger than a B-Cup. I can only name, like, three other girls who even wear a bra! Even if they do, they're training bras. Most companies don't like their dancers with my kind of chest. Weighs us down, they think. They want their dancers to be box-shaped, as if straight out of the box from the factory that produces ballerinas. Most girls dream of having a tiny waist, large breasts, and a great butt. Not in here. You do ballet, you want none of that. You want to be lean, slender, and flat. But it's not like I could have warded off puberty with a spell or something. That'd be nice, but unfortunately, I'm the only one here with a hint of what reality is like.

Lottie slips a girdle over my head. She doesn't pull it down to my waist, but leaves it smooshing my boobs back down to a B. _There is no way I'm dancing like this! I'll die just stepping on stage!_

"This should do for your pictures. I'll have to make some adjustments later, so you'll be more comfortable opening night."

"Oh, God. Thank you, Lottie."

"Oh, stop. You make me blush, love. Now, go on. You'll look stunning in those pictures. Comp me a print, will you? My daughter will just adore posting a poster of such a beautiful ballerina on her wall."

"Sure." I squeak, my breath stolen by the constricting costume and girdle.

Next thing I know, I'm modeling in front of a blank canvas and a camera is yelling at me to turn this way, turn that way, chin up. The photographer is invisible behind the flashes and dim lights.

"Perfect!" a dramatic flash follows the camera man's shout. "Now, can I get one with a little more of a serious look, Tea? Remember, you're Ancient Egypt's very first serial killer now, right? Leave a legacy with your eyes, you can't have amateur murderers thinking they can handle all _this_." he traces my body up and down in the air with his index finger aimed at me. "Good, doll. Look a little more into the camera. Scare me. You're Sekherta now. You're a fierce, fierce queen."

I don't believe my expression, if at all I have one, has changed at all, but he seems to approve of what I'm doing. He keeps saying beautiful, fierce, look this way, look that way. The camera keeps flashing violently and rainbow orbs are marring my vision already.

"Ok, that's a wrap. Thank you, Tea, that was wonderful. I'll pick the best one and it should be printed on the programs by tomorrow morning. Trust me, you looked stunning. The audience will want to frame the programs when they get home."

"Merci beaucoup, mon cher." Madame Thibeault answers before I can. They're already kissing each other's cheeks, walking out into the hallway in their debonair ways. Not sure what do with myself, I wait for them alone in the studio. My face is heavy in make up and my hair is pulled unbelievably tight into the traditional ballet bun. I think it's dizzying myself, actually. Once the door shuts behind Madame Thibeault and the photographer, I stumble on my own two feet into the wall. My hands outstretch, just barely stopping my face from crash landing into the plaster.

This nauseating effect; it was timed, it was planned. Somehow, someway, by _someone_. I had felt just fine- perhaps a tad melancholy that I am stuck in here while the rest of Domino twirls in the snow out there- but fine, more importantly. Now I can hardly stand. Now that I am alone in this room. Or as my normal, logical tracked mind tries to rationalize. The walls feel slanted, so I jump away from them. They are inclined enough that they form a point at the chandelier in the center of the room. The room is no longer a rectangular, fabulous prison cell, but almost like a pyramid bricked and molded by ancient secrets.

I can't tell where the horizon is or is supposed to be. It suddenly reminds me of all the times Joey and Tristan would talk about the dumb things they did when they were high. The studio's appearance is in layers of greens, reds, and blues. It's in lava-lamp orbs in some spots and doubles in another. A second's blare shoves me into visions of times past. Only slices of what was. Laconic glimpses of a life unknown. At first I the Millennium Puzzle, still staring out to who knows what. But then there are flies buzzing into a black mass and the image changes to a bloodied hand with fingers uncurled and defeated. There are laughs lingering in my ears. Laughs that are dowsed in sobs and panic. Hysteria. A pulse hungers just between breaths.

I look down into my arms. It seems I've sat down, my arms cradling a frumpy cloth as I hunch over it. Whatever is beneath these layers of cloth is still and warm. Honey thick blood runs through my costume and glues into the creases of my skin. I just want to cry. _Scream_. Let my body writhe with pain and with an unannounced sorrow. I watch the room disappear again, and allow myself to be taken by the sight of a woman's hands caressing the lid of a trunk. Her coffee-colored fingers blithely follow along the engravings. There is a warm breeze brushing through her dress, between her slender fingers, and sweeping up my hair. As tranquil and as delicate as this vision bemoans to be, I know that locked in that trunk, are all the scars Sekherta has stowed away.

"Sekherta." the name slices at the end of y tongue. I can finally exhale, and with it, the room has relaxed. "I have your part now, Sekherta. Does that bother you? That I am dancing the story of your life? Is that why you did those terrible things to the other dancers? To Josephine Pena? To Fantasme?" -my throat catches- "To Angeline?"

Nothing. Not a sound ensues.

I don't want believe in a stupid curse about a ballet. I don't want to believe that all the tortures suffered by Josephine Pena and Fantasme Dvorzhetski actually happened. I don't want to know better than thinking their pains were only coincidental, as they both had danced Sekherta when eerie things began happening to them. I don't want to believe that Sekherta could be here now, plotting how to eliminate me as she did Angeline. But do I really have any other explanation? How long can I go on pretending I'm oblivious? How long is it until it's too late?

I have to tell Yami.

* * *

><p><strong>Short chapter. Sorry.<strong>

**I'm facing a few difficulties.**

**I promise the next chapter will help out and be a lot better.**


	10. Act 2, Scene 5: One Wife Down

Act II, Scene V

Against my will, I have fallen victim to stress and exhaustion. Ok, and any other time I wouldn't mind so much being murdered by that. Like, say, my room for instance. But not now. Not in the middle of class. My body won't even come to a compromise it's just so burnt out right now. I'm practically a creaky old floorboard whenever I cringingly move. My calves burn beneath the desk, throbbing from the previous night's rehearsal. Really, I just want to be able to sleep off this pain- the one that feels like glass shards in my shoulders, the one that feels like razors nipping my abs, the one that feels like someone just Texas chainsaw massacred my big toes. And when weighing the options of feeling every ache and sore muscle while learning about dividing polynomials, and sleeping the next thirty-or-so minutes away? No competition.

I give in to fatigue, cuddling up against my textbook and binder. I don't think it's that big a deal. I mean, Joey's a professional at sleeping in class, and practically the entire row next to me is bonked. Before I close my eyes entirely, I sneak a peak at Yugi through the space between my arms. Despite his boredom, he's wide-eyed and taking notes. I used to be able to do that too. I smile, not that he can see, and it's just so soothing. Like, green tea for a headache kind of soothing. I kind of want to 'psst' his attention my way and say something to him. Anything, really. "_Hi_", "_Good morning_", "_I really wish I had the guts to tell you how much I like you_". Stuff like that. Minus that last one. _Yugi_. I say his name over and over in my head like it'll ward off and evils and demons. That'd be a great help if it could right now. My eyes droop, and it seems like stage lights have dimmed. And I see Yugi, just turning to look at me as my eyes close. All I see is the Millennium Puzzle.

My body burns from the inside out.

Music twinkles beyond the fading voice of my teacher. Rustling of papers, tapping pens, and gossiping whispers are all replaced by hot winds rushing past my ears, footsteps thumping against stone, and breath, heavy and thick, struggling to tunnel a way out of my lungs. Jewels crash all around. I was the one that threw them. Somehow, I just know this. The gold and the diamonds hit the floor so loudly, the sounds win over all the others. Even the music that runs around in the background. Sekherta's hungry, cold music- the one that plays when she supposedly seduces the Pharaoh in front of everyone in the throne room. There are cries and sorrow trapped in my throat, but they won't come out as anything but roars of hate and pain. I howl as I toss everything to the ground. Glass shatters. Beads burst. Anything and everything in my path is at my disposal. And I use them to tear myself apart.

I am Sekherta, and my heart has been strewn about the floor. I live this dream through her eyes, through her body that surges with disdain and inclemency.

"Amunet?" I hear a voice call. The voice sounds gentle enough, but there are multiples of it that mask the validity of its innocence.

"Sitamun. Iiti." My mouth speaks dryly.

"Nebet Amunet, is… is everything alright?"

My eyes can hardly focus on the girl speaking to me- which I'm surprised that I can even understand some of what she's saying. My glance wanders onto everything but her. I see down a grand hallway plumed with darkness and pillars. Then, I stare out across a balcony. There is night sky like none I have ever seen. I don't think stars have ever shined so bright or so numerously in all my life. But there they are, mapping out a fate as unfamiliar to me as the symbols etched onto the walls. I step closer to the edge. At first I think I'll just swing over the wall and wait for the wind to guide me to my death. _Oh, the temptation. Yes. Yes. End it all now. _But then the small, multiple voices fiddle from the mouth of the girl.

"Amunet. Please… you do not look at all well."

"No." my voice croaks with a shady weight. "I am… fine. Everything is fine. Dua Neter en etj."

"Then why have you broken your fine things? Was that not you uncaging such guttural cries?"

"Yes, It was I. Does that frighten you?"

"In truth, nebet-i, yes. It does."

I did not say anything for the longest time. Everything began to swell inside me. This rather calm, quite pleasing aggression rose above all. There was much satisfaction in this, something almost sensual pulsing through me. I stretched my shoulders just ever so slightly and then my neck. Everything is done in some cat-like way. And then I was ready. I'm simply, hungrily, maliciously ready.

All the ensues next is a blur. Somehow she's on the bed, and somehow I am too. Only she's screaming. Only I'm muffling the sound with a cloth of a sort. I press my entire weight on her. My arms screech with muscle and power. Her writhing frantically beneath me chops away at my vision. And that's fine by me, 'cause I don't want to see any more of this. I want to wake up. Now! I close my eyes and open then. Close. Open. Close. Open. Every time it's the same. She still battles beneath me. Her lungs still plead under my weight. Her air is none. A tremendous crunch and snapping sound pierce through the muffling sheet. The feel of it echoes in my palms. I think she gives out one last hidden cry under the sheets. With that, her body stills. I hold the sheet, or pillow, or whatever it is, over her just a little longer.

Satisfied with the seconds- _minutes? hours?- _that have gone by, I throw the sheet off of her. Her eyes are wide open and still glued to the darkness they were last lost in. It's her jaw that had snapped, that had crunched and broke under the pressure of my strength. Her mouth hangs awry because of that. Her golden, youthful face is locked in her last horrified moments. And despite the fact that I have already claimed her life, I am not yet done. I've not yet won.

Carrying her body down the hallway that seemed to go on and on like the Nile was a lot easier than I thought. I made it down with hardly a noise, and more importantly, without any eyes peeping from beyond. I'm sure I was planning on avoiding them. The hard part is finding a way to get her to fit into this box in my room. No, not a box. A chest. It was a finely carved chest, decorated and painted with so many things I just don't understand. There's another girl too; sleeping on my bed. Sleeping, not dead. I don't want _that _girl dead. Just this girl in my arms- Sitamun, I think her name is. And I have to do my best not to wake the sleeping girl. I position her into the chest again and again. I repose her in all the ways I can think of, but nothing seems to work. Either the chest is too small or she's too big.

I feel a grin part my face. And I plead with myself to wake up. Now! _Now!_ I want to wake up! I'd much rather listen to the teacher, feel every bit as sore and as tender to the touch as my awake self does than to be here dreaming- seeing- Sekherta's dealings! Because I'm running my hands down this dead Sitamun's legs. With one hand gripping the base of her cool foot and the other pressing down just above her knee-cap, I then thrust her leg upward. Her knee pops and crunches and bends in all the ways a knee shouldn't. I can now maneuver it the way I want without friction.

_Wake up, Tea! Wake up!_

I reach for a dagger that is conveniently awaiting my touch at a small table. The sleeping girl moves slightly and I pause.

"Em heset net Amun." she mumbles drearily. "Em… Em hotep, hem-ek."

She quiets again, falling back into her dream. Now I can return to my little project. I am determined to make Sitamun fit into this chest. I feel I can accomplish that even more now that I'm accompanied by this dagger. Blood is already dry on its edges. I must have used this once before. On a friend? On a foe? I am careful not to make much of a mess, so I cut across the torso, just below the breast. The blood plops out of her as if it had already pooled. Even in this dream, this nightmare, I can smell the odor at war with my nose. I can feel myself pulling away her skin like opening window curtains to a fresh, bright morning. I reach for the ribs. _Break. Snap. Crack. _

See how much better she bends?

_God, wake up! Wake me the hell up now!_

Finally she fits. I position her perfectly, contorted and deranged, into the chest that sits so near to my bed. I look at her one last time. My pulse has not spiked once. I am calm, pleasured. Sitamun looks back. Because now I can see through Sitamun's eyes. Now I am dead, looking absently back at my murderer. Now I can see the face of the monster. And the eyes that are there are the same one's I had seen in the rearview mirror of mom's car, the same one's Angeline must have seen in the mirror at rehearsal.

They are Sekherta's. She closes the chest, and I am in darkness.

* * *

><p>"Tea!" Tristan shouting is the sound I wake to.<p>

"Hello? Earth to Tea!" Joey shakes me.

"Huh?" my eyes open steadily. Joey, Tristan, and Yugi are congregated around me. They each look down onto me with peculiarity and wonder. The rest of the classroom is silent. All but my desk is empty.

Then I jump to my feet. "What? How long was I out? I've got to get to ballet rehearsals!"

"Whoa, whoa. Hold it there, missy." Joey snags my wrist. Still, the boys can't help but laugh when I flash them an angry face. At first I want to slug them, but then it occurs to me why they're laughing. My face is red and indented by the textbook and what I think is a pencil shape scarring across my cheek.

"Ugh!" is the best I come up with. Talented, right? I know. They call me the come-back queen. "I have to go. Why didn't you wake me up sooner?"

Joey defies me again by preventing me from putting my supplied in my book bag.

"We tried." says Yugi. "But… you were _gone_. We almost brought you down to the nurse."

"Part of being a professional sleeper-in-class like Joey and I is to doze off, but just enough so that you can still hear the bell ring. Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it."

"I… I just put my head down for a second."

"Yeah, aint that the worst?" Joey shakes his head.

"I…" I what? I don't even know what I'm trying to say. Now I'm just pacing through my thoughts, wondering how I got here. There's something I'm not remembering, there's something…

"I saw her!" I shriek, stepping back into the teacher's desk. "Oh, God, I saw her! Yugi you have to believe me!"

"Whoa, calm down. Who did you see?"

"Sekherta. I saw her. Oh… she… she killed someone. Si-Sit-… Sitamun! Yes, that's her. She killed Sitamun! It was terrible, Yugi. And I was her. I held the pillow down over her face, and her jaw broke, and she was so scared, and I just wouldn't let go! And then she wouldn't fit in the chest so I had to break her!"

"What are you talking about?"

I cross to Yugi, grab his shoulders and probably startle him with intense look in my eyes. I want him to see my vision through my eyes. By the fear I'm feeling, I'm sure it's imprinted there. It has to be.

"I had a dream. No. A vision. _I _was Sekherta, but they called her by a different name in Ancient Egypt. I was in her body as she killed Sitamun. I don't know who she was, but… she killed her."

"Ballet Sekherta?" Tristan tilts his head.

"Yes."

"Tea, I'm sure it was just a bad dream."

"No!" I shove Yugi away. "I know what I saw. That was… it really happened. It's not the future, it's not now. It's the past." I swallow. "Yami's past."

The three of them step back a little.

"So… if what Angeline said was true… then this means that it's begun."

I'm not sure I know exactly what that means. Will Sekherta try to kill me now? Will she plague me with more and more visions of the past? I nod back to Yugi, although not sure why. I don't tell them about what happened to all the other dancers who had her part. I don't dare mention Fantasme in the asylum or the ways in which the other ballerinas were slain by the curse. By Sekherta. It would only sicken them. It would only worry them. I might die. I knew that much. I might not be the same ever again. That is also a possibility. But, perhaps, with Yami on my side… maybe I could finish the story. Maybe I could tell the world about Sekherta. Maybe I could be the second dancer ever to dance the finale of _The Sands of Solipsism_. And maybe she'd find some sort of hellish peace…

"There's more wives to kill." I finish. Yugi grimly nods. He knows the story of The Sands of Solipsism. Sekherta isn't done yet.

* * *

><p>Tristan is kind enough to give me a ride to ballet rehearsal. Joey and Yugi refuse to leave me either, so they tag along until Madame Thibeault kicks them out.<p>

"We're very busy. You must go!" she'd shoo them away. I figure they'd wait for me outside in the snow- two out of three of them _are _idiots.

I am lost at rehearsals. Sure, my body moves. I dance absently, and Madame doesn't seem to mind. She even applauds after a few variations. But I don't know where I am really. I know I know these faces around me, but none of them mean anything to me. I've seen this stage, I've danced this dance. Everything is so foreign. So far away. I think I'm getting the hang of the 'solipsism' part in this ballet. All I can think about is dying. Yes: dying. Angeline dying, the ballerinas dying, Sitamun dying, me dying. Perhaps that is why Madame dotes so dramatically at my dances today.

The day whizzes by and the next thing I know it's dark out. I step out of the theatre, and sure enough, the guys are still there waiting for me. They're all blue from the cold. In Tristan's car, we say nothing. Nothing at all. It's the strangest thing for all of us- Joey in particular- to be so silent. There's this tense tinge to the air, and I feel like I just can't get enough oxygen into my lungs. We all want to say something, and yet nothing comes out. So they end up dropping me off at my house in a dark, quiet, feel. I don't like it.

"Later, Tea." says Tristan. Joey echoes. But Yugi only looks back at me, waiting for me to say something in particular to him. And boy do I want to.

"Bye, guys. Thanks for coming with me. And the ride. I don't know what I'd do without you all."

"No problem."

"And don't let me catch you trying steal my trademark again, T! You hear? Sleeping in class is _my_ thing!"

"Sure thing, Joey."

And they head off into the night. It only took those few sentences from my best pals to lighten my mood. If I didn't feel like splitting open my skull on the ice, I might as well have skipped into my house. I unlock the door to my house and push in. This time, though, Kuriboh doesn't come prancing down the stairs. Mom isn't making out with one of her gazillion boyfriends on the couch or on the kitchen countertop. Yes, I've seen it happen. It was awful, don't want to talk about it. Moving on!

I am alone- for the most part- in my freezing, black home. Even when I flip the light switch, the room seems dimmer than I remember. Now I don't feel so comfortable being alone. I used to be able to nook up some TV dinner, catch up with the Kardashians, and call it a day. I never had a problem being home alone. I guess when you grow up without a father and your mother is a work-a-holic stripper, you're used to it. But now I can't bear the thought of being left alone. Maybe I should have talked to the guys in the car, just to see if they could've given me any good paranormal-ass-kicking advice. Joey's a loon. He might've had some useful knowledge in that department.

But no. I decided to be silent. Not my worst decision, but it's definitely up there. I call out for a Kuriboh a few times, and when the bell on his collar doesn't jingle right away, I reach for my cell phone and call Yugi faster than I can say "duel".

* * *

><p><strong>Hey, guys. Sorry for the short chapters and late updates.<strong>

**I'm really struggling right now with... just so much stuff that I don't feel comfortable listing on the internet.**

**I promise updates soon on my stories. I-can-do-this!**

**Thank you for your patience.**


	11. Act 2, Scene 6: Just Breathe

Act II, Scene VI

_Hurry. Hurry. Hurry. _I pace around the kitchen, waiting to open the front door for Yugi. I know I've just put the phone down, and thinking he'll be at my door step the second I pressed end call is completely unrealistic. Still, I can't help but feeling that if he doesn't get here now, I won't be all here much longer. Because that's a realistic idea too? Ugh.

I really need a distraction right now, and frankly, Yugi was my best and only idea. I'm probably the lamest person ever right now because I've scared myself into not moving from this room. Even though the living room is a few steps away from the kitchen and there isn't a wall that separates the two, I'm too petrified to cross over. There could be another apparition in the TV screen, a terrible nightmare to envision behind the sofas, or Sekherta herself waiting and lurking behind the plants. See? I'm the lamest person ever! But when someone is as terrified as I am now, no matter the reason, the most impossible becomes pretty damn possible. As of this moment, nothing can convince me that these horrors don't exist. Except… maybe Yugi.

_Which is all the more reason why he should get here now_!

I am being throne to the wolves of my mind. All those images come back to me with howls and grunts. Those gruesome memories come back with such beastly detail. I don't want to remember the blood or the bodies or any of it at all, but I do. This Sitamun girl, she… she was exactly that. A _girl_. She couldn't have been anymore than sixteen and I watched Sekherta take her life away. I _was_ Sekherta, murdering her, and yet I was powerless to stop it. Just like Angeline. If I hadn't been so weak, maybe I'd have been able to open that door sooner, maybe I'd have noticed something earlier, maybe I could have said something that would have stopped her from doing what she did. Maybe she'd still be alive. But I was weak- _am_ weak. And Sekherta knows that. In fact, she's probably bored by it.

So I plop to the floor, guilt and sorrow weighing me down, and my back sliding against the cabinets. I wait for the shadows on the floor to swallow me whole. Maybe it'd be better that way. No one else would have to die because of a weakling like me. Madame Thibeault could always replace me with one of the generic faces from the corps or Angeline's soloist friends. Mindy, perhaps, or maybe even Rin Takaya. As for Yugi, though, and Joey, and Tristan, and… mom? Just thinking of them ties the knot in my stomach. What would happen to them when I'm gone? What would they do when Sekherta is finally through with me? When the dark queen drives me to suicide in a bathroom stall or smothers me beneath my own fear and silky regrets…

And before I can summon any answers- or better, any images of how I'll die- the doorbell chimes. I gently crawl over to the door, kind of not wanting to stand up because A: melancholy has added a few pounds, and B: my body still aches from rehearsals. I reach up to the doorknob and let Yugi in. He's a little bit stunned to see me just chilling here on the floor… in dim light…alone…at night. And I don't blame him. Yugi's nose and cheeks are red from the cold, and his shoulders and hair and sheeted with snow. Even his eyes look a little frosty.

"Yugi! Did you walk here or something? Come in, come in. Warm up."

"Oh, thanks. You called me just as Tristan and Joey pulled away from my house. But you sounded so urgent, I just bolted back here as fast as I could. Sorry if I took too long."

"Hm? Oh…" - he ran all the way back here in the cold _for me_? - "No, it's fine."

"Anything for a friend." he says. A _friend_. Oh, God, I think that's my heart constricting. Anyways, I can't be all too disappointed by that. At least he came back. At least he cares. At least he does his best. Who am I to leave him now? I glance at the shadows tracing the floor. I don't want them to devour me so much any more. I couldn't do that Yugi.

"Tea? If you don't mind my asking, why are you on the floor? Are you ok?"

"Um… I'm just feeling a little down."

"You know, I don't have a problem believing that." he tries to tease, but the grin he may be searching for in me doesn't exist. Instead of trying to coax me off the floor, however, Yugi does something better. He sits right beside me, cabinet knobs at his back and all, and smiles. This time I can't help but smiling back. If even a little. And with something short of a giggle, I tousle the snow out of his hair.

"Thank you, Yugi." I say more seriously. "Really. I mean it."

"Oh, it was no problem at all, Tea. Besides, ever since your new season of ballet started, we haven't really hung out. And if staying up all night is the only way I can hang out with you, I'm willing to go sleep deprived."

_Insert passionate, perfectly-timed kiss now_?

"No, I mean, really… thank you for coming back. Just before you got here, I was thinking … about death. Ok, um, _considering_ death more like it."

"What do you mean?" he steadies his gaze.

I'm not sure of what to tell him. That Sekherta will kill me or that I was thinking about killing myself before she does? That it's my fault Angeline is dead? I stare hard at the floor before even considering lifting my gaze to him. And when I finally do, I kind of wish I hadn't. The way Yugi is looking back at me makes me understand just how serious the situation is. It's as if he too has seen all the gruesome memories I am plagued by, or has somehow witnessed what Sekherta will do to me by looking at my face. He must know that I've just contemplated ending myself, because he isn't playing around. His look surrounds me in concern and protection. I never want to leave it.

"Tea…" he strains for an answer, but talks to me as though he were luring a small kitten from a corner.

I purse my lips like the words are stuck there. "I know why Angeline killed herself." I finally say. "I know why Fantasme is in an asylum. I know why all the other dancers who had the role of Sekherta are dead. And I know that it won't be much longer until I end up like any one of them."

"How could you even say that?" he lunges for my shoulders. "No! If you… if you did that… I would never forgive you _or_ myself."

"Sekherta killed the other dancers, Yugi. Ever since the ballet was first performed in the early 1900s, every girl who has had Sekherta's part died soon after. That is, _if _they made it to the finale. Fantasme is the only one who danced the entire ballet without an alternate, and she's locked up in solitary. Angeline knew what was coming, that's why she did it. That's why she decided to take her life before Sekherta could. It's probably less painful that way. And just like me, she probably didn't believe in the curse at first. Her accusing me of playing some kind of joke on her was her way of coping. She must have had the same nightmares I've had. She's witnessed the apparitions, the visions, … those eyes. The ones that never blink."

"But… Tea…"

My gaze snatches his by surprise. If I'm not mistaken, he jumps slightly away. He looks more concerned than ever.

"I don't know what she wants. Maybe revenge. Maybe freedom. Maybe someone to notice her. She drove Angeline to her death, Fantasme to the asylum, me to… I don't even want to know. And there is more to come, Yugi. So far, I've only witnessed two murders through Sekherta's eyes. One was all a bloody blur. It was when I stood up to Brett Banson the day Angeline killed herself. And all I could think of was killing Brett. I _wanted_ to kill him more than anything. It was a _need_, an impulse that took everything I had to fight against. The second was more vivid- _too vivid_. That's when she killed Sitamun. Story goes that Yami, or whichever pharaoh this was, had seven wives including Sekherta. Which means I have four more deaths to watch, Yugi! And even that's not set in stone! Who knows how many other innocent lives she's taken?"

Tears begin pelting down my face. Yugi wastes no time and pulls me nearer to him. He lets me cry there in his hold for a few moments, probably just as lost for answers as I am. I want him to be able to tell me everything will be alright and mean it. I want him to kiss this all better. But I know all too well that that's just asking for a miracle. His warmth around me does ease me, if even a little, but it is also a saddening touch. What if I never feel this again because Sekherta has stolen my life?

"We'll figure something out, Tea. There has to be a way out of this. Please, just stay strong."

He pulls me just a little more tighter with that, and I snuggle into his chest. So, here we are, two teenagers afraid to tell each other how we feel about the other, but our bodies so warm and so close on my kitchen floor. It's enough for now. Enough to dry my tears. There has to be something in this embrace that lets him know he's more than a friend to me. Maybe if I press my head against his chest just enough, his heart swill hear how often I think of him, how I blush when he gives me that signature smile of his. I wonder… maybe I can hear something more beating inside him too.

The Millennium Puzzle digs at my breasts. I didn't notice it at first, but now I can feel a sharp pain there. Obviously not the most comforting feeling in the world. I want to remain close to Yugi, though. I want to stay surrounded by his arms, lost in his scent of a fresh shower and his grandfather's game shop. It's like the smell of antiques, or at least, that's what it makes you think; a smell that can take you almost anywhere in time. Even Ancient Egypt. I pull away from Yugi only when I can not bear that pain any more. My heart shutters against my ribs. It is frightened, I fear, and struggling. Strange, but it almost feels like it's burning. My heart is on fire. I'd like to think that this is Yugi's doing and that I am so gosh-darn in love with him that my heart is about to burst. But this? This is painful. This is dangerous.

"What's wrong, Tea? Have I…" - _Oh no. What if he thinks I pulled away because I don't like him 'like that'_?- "I'm sorry."

"Oh, no. Don't be. I really needed that, Yugi. Thank you." I scramble for a wink, a lusty smile, anything that will let him know I wanted him to be that close. I end up with big eyes, staring right out into his and that pose where you're kind of leaning over to the guy and your upper arms end up squeezing your boobs together. Yeah. That one. I'm not a professional flirt or anything, but I think after years of watching my mom, I've picked up on a few of those useful skills.

Yugi nods and smiles reassuringly- this time with a sense of pride in that he just scored a few points on the potential-boyfriend scale. His face is sparkling with a blush and success, I just can't bring myself to toss that away with telling him about my new feelings for the millennium puzzle. Besides, that's something I should really bring up with Yami, right? No sense in ruining the moment I have with Yugi now. Because, well, there may not be many of these moments left.

_Please, _please_ let my sense of judgment be right this time._

"C'mon." I let out a small laugh and stand. "The kitchen floor really isn't the best place to be hanging out. You know?"

"Right." he stands along with me, rubbing the back of his head. There's something lingering in the air; words we need to say, something that needs to be done. And I know we both feel it, because as I'm pretending to brush dirt from my yoga pants, he's checking around for something he can use to divert the awkward silence. He finally finds it at the window above the sink. The street is stacked high with snow and not a single car has tried to conquer it. I know there's the ice from yesterday still lurking beneath it all too. The wind coils and wrestles the snow with every gust, making it difficult to see any more than a few yards out. Across my street, there's a small gathering of trees that reveal distant city lights just above them. It gives the night clouds that faded, mystical look of winter.

"Aw man. I couldn't ask Grandpa or Tristan to drive in this weather." says Yugi. "Guess I'm walking home again."

"What? Are you crazy, Yugi? No. You're not walking home in this." and then comes that light bulb moment. I think my luck may just be turning around. I mean, there's no way I'd let Yugi walk home in this weather. What kind of friend would I be to kick him out in the cold? But I think what I'm really afraid of is being left alone.

"Why don't you stay here for the night?"

The color vanishes from his face. Sure, he's stayed over Joey's and Tristan's, but never my house. Not a _girl's_. And it's not like tournaments either when sometimes we have to sleep around each other. No. This time it's just the two of us.

"Your mom is ok with that?" he stutters. _He's so cute when he's nervous_. I'm doing all I can not to shriek away my jitters or to smile goofily.

"Ugh. My mom? Please. Having a boy sleep over the house while she's away is something she'd be proud of me for."

"Oh. Ok then. Th-Thanks, Tea. "

I give him a small nudge. "No biggie. Anyways, you should call your grandpa. Any later and he'll be really worried about you. I'll go get some blankets."

"Right." he heads into the living room while I meet the bottom of the staircase. Upstairs is totally black; an intimidating sight that makes me reconsider going up there. Not the slightest glimpse of light or life stirs. A shadow consumes the upper floor, even a few of the top steps. I look back at Yugi, who is now waiting for his grandpa to answer the phone. It'd be stupid to ask him to come up with me- and I couldn't make him feel any more comfortably uncomfortable than he does now. I keep telling myself that I'm just being a big baby. But when the floor creaks from upstairs, I kind of _become_ a big baby. And I'm ok with that. My hand tightens on the railing, pushing the rest of me back so I don't walk up these stairs.

Yet there is a warmth around me. A hand, even. Yami. His spirit, although invisible to me, has come to me for that bit of reassurance. His protective energy runs through me now, and one by one, I take to the stairs. This journey upwards seems like a deranged forever. I used to just run up and down as I pleased; stomping down because I was late for ballet, clambering up them because I was too tired that my feet hardly lifted. I never realized how many steps there were. Five, six, seven…

_What if Sekherta can see Yami? What if she recognizes him? What would she do if he truly _is_ her ancient husband?_

Eight, nine, ten…

It's sad to think that his touch is so invisible. It's sad to think that he is not of my time. This warmth, this feeling… may be all we'll ever share. He's dead. I have to do well to remember that. It's just…

Eleven, twelve, thirteen. I've mastered the stairs and the darkness. It is so bleak up here that it's hardly home at all. I never used to have to really think about where a room is in my house. It was just natural. I mean, I've lived here all my life. But now I second-guess myself trying to find the hallway closet. I am fortunate, however, that I can preoccupy myself with Yugi's question:

"So, about Sekherta, what's our next move?" he calls from below.

"Well," I hardly think of anything to say. I just want to cut the silence and speak anything. "I don't know. But if we're going to figure a way out of this mess, we need to do it soon. Opening night is this Friday, which gives us four days. I really need to talk to Summer. She was Angeline's best friend. And especially considering how she was acting the other day when I tried confronting her, there's no doubt in my mind that she knows something. She completely avoided me. Angeline had to have said _something _to her."

"Right. And what about Fantasme?"

"Her too. If anyone knows more about this, it's her. But I highly doubt we can just waltz into an asylum and they'll let us talk to just anyone." I grab blankets and pillows out of the closet.

"Well, I can help you with Summer. If she won't talk to you, maybe I'll have some luck."

"Great. And I'll take Fantasme. I think that's something I should do alone anyways." _Alone. _Hearing it come from my mouth sends chills running through me.

My arms are overloaded with pillows, sheets, and blankets. I close the door with my foot and make my way back down the hall, but passing my room proves to be somewhat of a challenge. Don't ask me what drives me to do so, but I can't stop myself from peering into my room. Everything is just as I left it, and yet it feels all so foreign. I quickly strip down and hobble into pajamas. Knowing Yami may still be near doesn't stop me. Then, as I pull my hair from out of my tank top, I see that mirror no longer reflects my room. I can't see myself at all in my vanity. Only my shadowy figure appears in the reflection of this hallway. The floor is stone and lit with struggling torches. There are pillars opening the wall into a nightly view that's slightly out of my reach. Inscribed on them are Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and paintings of stories.

I know I should look away. This is probably just another of Sekherta's illusions. But I am frozen here I this icy, icy cold. A throbbing pain strikes my heart. It is in the same place that had irked me so dreadfully much when I'd hugged Yugi- where the Millennium Puzzle had dug at my skin. It burns. It _really_ burns. I go to scratch the agitated skin above my left breast, where I notice a swelling red spot beginning to bud. A ring of pink and ache perks above the rim of my Dark Magician Girl tank-top, and I quickly pull it up to cover it. But the pain remains.

"Tea." a voice bites my name with a fierce snap. It draws me back to the mirror where the scenery is still untouched. I stare back into Ancient Egypt. Waiting. Dreading. Squirming in my skin.

"Whore. Whore. Little whore." the same whispers sweep around the room. "Kill. Kill. Kill."

I shake my head. This is the voice that enticed me to murder Brett Banson. This is the voice that has serenaded me to murder many times before. I would not obey it. I can not! _Where is Yami's touch? Where is his warmth now?_

"Kill. Kill. Kill." it grows louder, more intent on swaying me. Screams shortly follow, like all her victims have congregated only to share their last terrified breaths. The sounds of their choking on blood, gagging on fear. I can only shake my head faster in hopes that it will make them go away. Then comes the shrill ringing that had once pierced the ears of everyone at ballet rehearsal. "_Kill. Kill. Kill_."

In the mirror, two shadows are seen against the pillars. Their sizes increase rapidly. They're running, one right after the other. The noises are so loud they reverberate through my bones. _Kill. Kill. Kill_. The shadows struggle. Fighting. Murdering. Squealing. _Kill. Kill. Kill. _Blood spatters against the pillars and all over my mirror. I almost feel like it splashes over my bare skin as a sick, demented tease. The noises explode. Screaming, shrilling, commanding anger rumbles over my ears and in my mind. And all I see between oozing streams of red is a head rolling across the alabaster floor of this Egyptian palace- the expression gawking in their last moments, the eyes wide and hardening against my gaze.

I've seen enough. I bolt for the door, blankets and pillows in hand, and thunder down the stairs. My heart crashes against me, against the sore that now surges with complete pain. I am almost completely winded when I reach the bottom of the stairs. I clutch the rash now encompassing my heart.

"Tea?" Yugi stands in the living room. "What's wrong? What happened?" He's almost as startled as I am.

I don't speak for the longest time. Huddled against the sofa, Yugi cradles around me and lets me breathe. Just breathe. And, really, that's all I want to do. Because I don't know how much longer I'll be able to.


	12. Act 3, Scene 1: Bleed

Act III, Scene I

The thing about today is that I honestly don't know how it began. I mean, I know where I am now at least. In the sewing room behind the stage, woven into this maze of tulle and rhinestones. Girls are fluttering about and squishing themselves in packs just to get a look at themselves in the mirrors. They whine things like "let me see", "this bodice itches", or demand that one of the seamstresses fix a hemming or a headpiece. It smells like sweat doused with perfume all around. At first, everything I see is a black and white wash- faded, floating, and trailed. And like an old photograph developing, colors begin to wash over me. Things finally come to speed. The noise is intense as it synchronizes with the movements of everything, and I want to cover my ears by how loud it all is. I feel more awake, more responsive and weighted.

"Is that ok?"

I turn to my side. Lottie is there, wiping sweat from her brow, and pinching together my costume with her chubby fingers. I have that deer-in-a-headlight look and a sour pout on my lips. I'm not sure how long my face has been like this, but I'm assuming a while because Lottie doesn't seem surprised. When I go to speak, I'm not sure any words are there. My mind is almost as blank as I feel.

_How did I get here? Wasn't I just with Yugi? He slept over…_

"Tea?" she asks again.

I try again for a voice; "Hm? It's… it's fine."

"You sure? You can move around alright? It's not too tight or anything?"

I nod, though I have no feeling for the costume. The only thing I _do _feel really is the light-headedness and the need to scratch my chest. Looking down, the costume really squeezes my breasts so that they look flat and like someone just played polymerization on them. But it pushes the rash upwards. The skin atop my left breast is freckled with irritation and red spots, and the urge to rub my nails over them is worse than when I had the chicken-pox.

"'Kay." she pins the bodice together. "Oh, Tea, don't scratch that. If it's still there on opening night then we'll just put some powder over it. But leave it alone, ok?" She gives the costume a few good tugs. It shakes me into my head again. Not by much, but just enough. I can finally feel the whole weight of my body, like I've just touched back down to earth. _Mission control? Tea has just landed. Over._

"Lottie!" I take a giant gulp of air, waking from my dream-like state. When finally everything hits me. I've blanked out all day. I wasn't in my body. So who was? "What time is it?"

"Four thirty."

"How did I get here?"

She cocks an eyebrow. "You… walked down the hallway?"

"No, I mean… I was… but. How long have I been here?"

Lottie presses a hand to my forehead and searches my panicked countenance for something useful. I'm not positive anything is there for a doting, motherly seamstress to read, but she tries anyways. She steps away, taking a whole up and down, sideways, diagonal look at me and then places a finger to her bright red lips. When she can't find the words, or maybe is finding a way to avoid telling me the truth, she reaches again for my bodice and wiggles it roughly against my skin.

"Are you sure this fits right? Something looks off."

"Lottie, please…" I snatch her wrist without even thinking. I feel more aggressive and on edge, like I can take on the world. "Look, I know this sounds strange, and I can't really explain it. I literally don't remember anything I did today. So, please, tell me. When did I get here? What have I been doing? Did I say anything?"

"What's wrong, deary? You've been here all day, or at least to my knowledge. I haven't heard any gossip from the girls who've come in for repairs or shoes either. Wish I could tell you more, dear, but I've been working hard on your costume, sewing the girdle to the inside of the bodice. Now you don't have to worry about the other girls nitpicking at your bra size, telling you to lose weight. They're just jealous of your figure is all. Oh, listen to me rambling. Tea, Tea, Tea. Has your head been in the clouds again?"

I don't answer. There's just too much wondering- _fearing_- that's stirring in my head for me to form a comprehensible sentence. Lottie continues speaking, but I hardly hear a word when Summer walks past. She catches up with the rest of Angeline's old clique, giggles quickly, and then passes a glance to me. I think all the sadness in the world is locked up her eyes. I don't know how her fragile self is capable of holding the tears down, but she only cries invisibly. Like my mom. Yet she smiles so softly. Two perfect petals form such a sincere greeting- or perhaps a farewell- that I am torn by their meaning. Yugi must have said something to her. He must have!

And speaking of! What on earth happened to him? Last thing I remember, Yugi was asleep on one of the sofas in my living room. Yes. He was facing away from me, blanket up to his neck, and tucked into my couch. I must have woke up during the night to have obtained that memory. Ok, so that's one clue. Something woke me up. Think, Tea. Think! Before that? We watched a movie. "Kung-Fu Panda". There was popcorn, we were wrapped in a blanket, sitting next to each other. Our hands lightly touched once- when we both went to grab some popcorn at the same time. There were goosebumps. And before that? I'd seen a vision. Sekherta beheaded one of Yami's ancient wives. Yugi had to comfort me, and bribed me out of my consternation with a movie and his closeness.

He must have said something to Summer. She may know what in the hell has been going on.

"Excuse me." I say to Lottie, slipping away from her. The real challenge is not tripping on the vine ribbons on the floor, or inching past the costume racks being shoved by greedy and stressed girls. Summer knows this best. Last year she was late for her queue because her foot got caught in one of the ribbon piles. So she decides to meet me half way in the isle.

"Hey." she speaks through a sore throat.

"Hey." I say too. It's really the best I got right now. After that it's just a matter of nerves. I take a deep breath, hopefully readying myself for anything this conversation may entail. And before I can even ask her about Yugi and if he said anything, or what the hell have I done today, Summer looks over her shoulders and comes out with this:

"Don't let Yugi come to the ballet."

"What?" I squeal. She's quick to put a strongly lotioned hand over my mouth.

"He told me everything. We talked this morning. If you care about him, Tea, you'll tell him not to come."

"Summer… I… I don't understand."

Again she looks over her shoulders. This time she takes my arms in hers and ushers me out of the sewing room. A few of her friends walk past, waving and smiling, and she pretends like everything is just fine. No one notices a thing. I'm totally jealous. I wish I could do that. Once we're past the threshold, we break into a sprint so that no one has a chance to see us together. Except Hayden. He waits at the end of the hall for us, like this was all planned or something. He holds the door to a room I've never even seen before while Summer rushes to shove me inside. I feel like I'm in the mob or something.

Then it's just us three. With the door closed and the frosted windows sitting high above Domino streets, there's no way out. Yup. I'm in the mob and I'm about to get whacked by the tiniest, most petite ballerina and her buffed, twinkle-toed boyfriend.

"Where are we?" my voice echoes over the tile floor and faded walls.

"One of the old soloist suites. Don't worry. No one ever comes in here. This used to be Fantasme Dvorzhetski's personal dressing room. But now it's just a secret hangout for couples who want to 'loosen up' between lessons."

Figures that Summer and Hayden would know about this room then. Did Angeline know about it too?

"Fantasme Dvorzhetski!" I tighten. Just the name sends sparks crackling through my veins. I've never been so hasty, so ready for violence, but my fingers curl into a fist anyways. _I want to kill._

"Yes." Summer nods. "And that's probably why you feel so aggressive right now."

"Hunh?" _How did she-_

"How do I know that?" she pauses to embrace a tiny laugh. "Angeline told me. Actually, it was in this very room, just a few days before she died. She told me that every time she so much as thought about Fantasme, she just… wanted to kill her. She said she couldn't resist. It was out of her control. The same thing went for anyone who tried to protect her. If anyone showed the slightest interest in helping Angeline, she would lash out. She said she didn't mean to; it was just the shadow that fed on her, guarding its meal."

"Sekherta."

She nods again. "And that is why you mustn't allow Yugi or any of your friends to come to the performance. If she doesn't ruin your relationships with them first, she will kill them. Like Angeline killed her sister."

"What?"

"Her sister got too close. In fact, I'm sure she could have freed Angeline of this curse had she just had a little more time. But Sekherta wouldn't have that. So she took control of Angeline's body and drowned her sister in their Jacuzzi."

Sweat nibbles at my face. As much as I am willing myself not to, my mind finds all the loopholes that allow myself to conjure up such images. I never met Angeline's sister, let alone knew she had one, but I assume she too would have had that shimmering blonde hair. And now to imagine it all in tangles, roped around Angeline's fingers, and swirling beneath the bubbles of a boiling Jacuzzi. My face grows hotter.

"And it seems Sekherta has already begun to experiment with possession again."

"You mean… the reason I don't remember anything from today is because Sekherta had control over my body?"

"Exactly. She's not stupid. She knows how near opening night is. Don't worry, though, you didn't hurt anyone. Just Yugi."

I freeze. All the blood in my body is still and yet my head keeps spinning. My heart takes one more good whack at my lungs and breaks off. I couldn't have hurt Yugi! I don't care who's possessing my body, I'd never let anyone hurt Yugi! Right? Panic has thrusted everything into motion again. My blood now rushes, my heart now palpitates, my body tingles and surges to life. Aggressive, angry, threatened life.

"No! What happened to Yugi?"

"I'm afraid he wouldn't say. You'd have to ask him, so long as he wants to see you ever again. You know, it's a shame. You have such pretty blue eyes, Tea. But today… they were unbelievably black."

"_What happened to Yugi_?" my voice sounds just like Angeline's when she had pushed me against the lockers. It bears far too much disdain to be my own, but I know that it is my mouth it fires from. It's just so full of hurt that it sounds…evil.

"If you're so dreadfully worried about him, then keep him away from here. Do not let your friends come to opening night!" this time she bursts through her sore throat to launch a full on yell. Hayden steps up beside her and places an easing hand upon her shoulder. It seems to relax her, bring her back to earth. Like Yugi's presence could do to me.

"Summer," I press for something to say. Maybe she'll spill something about what happened- what_ I _did- to Yugi. But nothing comes out. I hold back. She's still shaken up about Angeline and probably knows what's bound to happen to me too. I highly doubt that keeping calm is something she even planned on. She's scared. She's hurt.

"Won't Sekherta kill you too for helping me?" I ask instead.

She smirks then.

"But I'm _not _helping you. I already know there's nothing I can do for you, Tea. I went through this once with Angeline, and I will not play this game again. I'm just trying help Yugi and your other friends by telling you not let them come. Unless you want them to die along with you."

It's a warning. The threat is all in her eyes, although she knows she won't be the one delivering it. I think she may be about to cry or say something incredibly rude, but before she can, Hayden takes her hand and leads her out the door. They leave me inside Fantasme's old dressing room where the only light leaks in from the grey winter sky beyond the windows. Without knowing what else to do with myself, I allow everything to soak in. There's a faint scent of lavender beneath the chipping paint. There's a spider climbing around the old nails on the wall. There's icicles forming at the windows. There's a spirit ruining and ending my life.

* * *

><p>He doesn't answer my calls. As mom drives me home, I call Yugi again and again and again <em>and again<em>. He doesn't pick up any of them. Now I'm stuck with wondering what I did. What could I have done to him that would make him ignore me? _Anything for a friend_, he said. So why isn't he answering my calls? He came to me in a snowstorm, held me when I was scared, stayed up with me to protect me. And now I don't even exist to him? I must have done something …. something… ugh! I don't even want to think about it. But the more I do think about it, the angrier I become at myself and at Yugi for not answering, the more loudly my rash itches. I'm suffocating in this tiny space, smothering myself in my frustration. My chest burns. My heart thumps. My head throbs. I keep squirming around in my seat until I pull the seatbelt off my chest. Now I can freely itch the burn that mocks me.

It hurts so wonderfully when my nails can run over the sores. I want to smile even though it feels like someone has lit a match over my breast. There's electrifying, throbbing pain spewing into every inch of me as I scratch, but there is pleasure. There is relief. It lifts me into another dimension so that when I look out the window, I see an Ancient Egyptian city whizzing past me. Women with baskets on their heads. A busy market. Donkeys carrying goods and sacks. Some ways off there is music; a sweet tambourine maybe, or a flute of some kind. But whatever it is, everything is gone when I blink again. Only the skyscrapers of Domino trace out the horizon as we drive over a bridge.

I think that maybe if I close my eyes again, really focus, I could see more. Scratch just a little harder. Faster. The twisting of pain and pleasure rip through me again, and this time I see running. Feet are running over sand, over dirt. I'm not in the car driving past all these people and this city, but instead am running through the crowds and past the excitement. My breath is heavy in my head. I trip for just an instance but regain myself quickly. There are smells all around. Spices and fires burning, a crisp summer breeze. I get an earful of conversations in that rough, archaic tongue. I am running, running, running.

Then I'm back in the car again; still caged, still angry. Still scratching. It's as though I inhale the past, sucking in a breath of Ancient Egypt and a moment in Sekherta's life; but then I exhale the present, returning to modern city with my modern struggles and my modern melancholy. I drift between the two times as fast as my lungs will carry me. Inhaling what is dead, what has long since past. Exhaling what is now, what is painful. This must be how Sekherta breathed.

I come to a temple. I can't see very much of it, but that is what I deduce from the great statue standing before me. I feel the itch of the present lingering in the past as I kneel before the stone god. Burning, throbbing, painful pleasure. I scratch more and more and…

"Tea!" mom screeches.

In the car. In the present. Modern city with modern struggles and modern melancholy. Winter skies, mother cries. I finally sink into _now_, feeling the car around me, my body molded into the seat.

"Tea, what the hell are you doing? Stop!" mom commands in a way that I never heard her do before.

I try and figure out what she's talking about, and all that means I have to do is look down. There is blood on my hand. My blood. This time it's not a hallucination in the mirror or a vision of Sekherta's murderous hands. It's real. My hand. My blood. I have scratched a crater into my chest. At the very least, I pulled away one layer of skin to feel the open fragility of the ones underneath. Blood dribbles down into my sports bra and fills my cleavage like a river. The rash is now an open wound, rounded and big enough for me to put at least two fingers in. Not that I'd ever want to do that. Ow. Well, this is going to leave one hell of a nasty scab.

"What the hell." mother reaches for the glove compartment where beneath the mountain of condoms she finds a few napkins. "Clean up and hold this against the boo-boo. Gosh, T, where's your head?"

"I… I don't know." I hardly realized I've taken the napkins from her already. I put some pressure against the wound but it only burns more.

"I do not want blood on my seats, Tea. You hear?"

A small noise comes out of my mouth- a half-assed yes or something like that. Where _was_ my head? I stare out the window for the rest of the drive home. I realize that I want to tell my mom. I want to tell her that I'm being haunted by an evil Ancient Egyptian spirit, and that I may not be around to be her baby girl, her little T, much longer. But I can't. I don't know why. But I can't.

I call Yugi one more time when we get home. He still doesn't answer. So I decide to call Tristan, who at least lets me go to voicemail, and then Joey who finally picks up. As soon as I hear that annoying, wonderful, agitating voice on the other end, I leap inside myself and burst up into my room.

"Joey! Oh, Joey, thank you. Thank you."

"_Uh… ok_?"

"Listen, Joey, have you heard from Yugi?"

"_Hm. Now that you mention it… no. Haven't seen or heard him all day. Why? Did something happen?"_

"No. I mean, well, yes. But that's the thing. I don't know."

"_So you called to ask me to ask him because…"_

"He won't answer me. He slept over last night and, well-"

"_Slept over? Oh, wait, wait. I know where this is going. You two finally-"_

"No we did not!" I yell defensively. But I think it's more because I'm kind of mad that we… _didn't_. "Joseph Wheeler, you get your mind out of the gutter this instant! This is important!"

"_Sheesh. Alright_."

"Look, I don't know what happened after that. See… Sekherta had control over my body."

"_You mean like when Yugi and the pharaoh switch places?"_

"Kind of. Yeah. Except Yami isn't trying to kill Yugi or anyone who tries to help him. And also because Yugi is conscious of what goes on when Yami has control over his body. I wasn't. Up until a few hours ago, an evil queen has been in my body and I have no idea what went on. Apparently Yugi talked to that girl Summer, and she said I may have done something to hurt him. I mean, Sekherta did, but it seemed like I did because- ugh! You know what I mean!"

"_Gotcha. Look, I'll see what's up with Yug. You just chill for a little while and try not to let that evil hag get control over you. Ok?"_

"Easier said than done. But I'll do my best. Thanks, Joey."

"_No problem. Now get some rest_."

"Right. Bye."

That was it. I was going to see Fantasme first thing in the morning. I can't afford to wait any longer. As soon as threw my phone down on the bed, that's when I made up my mind. I've been a sitting duck for far too long. And now I may have hurt my closest friend in the entire world. I had to fight back. I can't just let Sekherta win. What Yugi think if I didn't even try? Now it's my turn to duel.

* * *

><p><strong>Hey, beautifuls.<strong>

**I want to say thank you for bearing with me here. I know my updates have been, well, ****extremely slow. I have been so incredibly busy. It's the new season of cheerleading, plus school, ****plus work, plus all that jazz. **

**Anyways, thank you for staying with me. You guys are great!**

**ALSO! This fic will be finished with a few more chapters (4-5 maybe?), so I'm considering getting to ****work on other stories. Please see my poll on my profile to vote on what I should work on next, ****or PM if you want to suggest something different. ****Like maybe work on something together?**

**~ Love, **

**Raving In The Rain**


	13. Act 3, Scene 2: Angel of the Asylum

Act III, Scene II

"You are so lucky that someone could fill in for me, Tea. But why on earth you would wake me up at six in the morning to go to some loony bin is beyond me. I would have understood if you needed like a doctor or a Starbucks; you know, a real emergency. But an asylum? I swear I just don't understand you kids these days. Is this about that Angeline girl? I mean, the police came to my job the other day asking about you. I told them you're a good girl, wouldn't do nothing to hurt nobody- heck, you don't even have time for murder with ballet lessons and all. That's what I said. And they were all like, 'well, ma'am this' and 'well ma'am that'. You know what I mean?"

Mom goes on like this for what feels like hours. Her long, zebra-print nails tap against the steering wheel every time she makes one of her dramatic hand gestures. She says things like 'this better be important' or 'you sure you want to go', like she's whining about the trip. Personally, I think she should just be happy that we're spending time together. It's quite a rarity that we do. And then she moans about having to call into work and getting another stripper to do her act and what not. Then more about police men and what she'd really like to with them, but I won't get into that. Sheesh. Really, she's probably just more aggravated about not doing her hair or forgetting false lashes than anything else. That's my mom for you.

I don't pay much more attention to it though. I rest my head against the seat and sink back to last night. I had a dream. A vision. The one with the ballerina dancing in flames again. Except this time there was more. This time the flames didn't just swivel and swirl around her fouettes and her grand-jêtes, they caught her. She had almost finished the most beautiful variation of Sekherta's death scene, the final act, when some hand-like flame reached for her ankle. It was downhill from there. The laces of her pointe shoes were set aflame and her stockings melted into her flesh. But she kept dancing. She kept crying. Kept twirling. Flesh burning. Graceful pain and screams as innocent as the violins. The stage beams collapsed all around her and the audience had long since evacuated, but the show had to go on.

I sat in the audience. I watched her burn bright and beautifully. It was something like watching as the lights of a Christmas tree were finally turned on; a finale of pride and perfection. There was art amongst the horror. I clung to the cushion chair, enraptured by the death of beauty. My hair was pulled up high and curled. A pearl necklace shaped my neck long and tall, and I was decorated by a long blue gown.

In the flames there was life and movement. I saw the lives stolen by Sekherta, each soul woven into the fires. I watched children run through them, chasing one another merrily and simply. Many women shared a laugh or a bit of gossip. Men brought their fishing boats to shore and emptied their great nets. There were so many of these flame people walking about the crumbling stage. Walking like they were alive. Laughing like they weren't murdered. Unconcerned about the dancer who was burning to death in their entanglements. And I was no better. I ran my white-gloved hands through the smoke and stood to applaud her. When she went for her final bow, hoisting her burning self up in such prestige, she looked at me with absolution. And the curtain, set completely alight, came charring down on top of her.

When I awoke this morning, my chest was covered in blood. I'd been itching all through the night, peeling away the scab and deepening the wound. I wonder if Angeline felt this too. I wonder if she had a rash that yearned to be scratched, a hole in her chest like mine.

There had to a meaning in all this. There had to be a purpose in all the suffering, the fearing, the rash, and the death. Is this burning ballerina a sign of what's to come, or a fate that has passed? Why can I see the murders of the ancient past? Why do her victims still live on in the flames of my dreams? Sekherta didn't just kill. No one _just_ kills. There has to be a motive- be it a subconscious one even- but one does exist. I wonder… what was Sekherta's? Why did she and her motive exist, and why do they still exist thousands of years after her death?

"Damn it, Tea! Stop scratching that again!" mom slaps my wrist.

I hadn't even realized I'd been scratching. I hadn't felt a thing other than wonder and possibly comfort. Isn't that a sad thing; I'm so enthralled in this mess of horrors, visions, and spirits that it's almost second nature now. Normal. Luckily, though, I haven't broken the scab on my chest. Until this goes away, which I'm praying it does, I only wear shirts that cover it up. My only problem is opening night when I have to wear my costumes…

"Sorry, mom. I… I didn't know I was doing it."

"Are you in your head at all these days, boo? You seem so lost all the time now. I mean, every time we're in the car," she pauses as she realizes our drives in the car are our _only_ time together, "well, you're just so _gone_. At least we used to talk a little. Well, argue more like it but… but now there's nothing. Nada."

Something in her voice makes me sit up and want to pay more attention to her. It's not her usual gossipy run-ons or her complaining about the line at Dunkin Donuts. No. This time my mother actually sounds real. And not the kind of real where it's like she's about to tell me about where babies come from, but like she's really trying to say something meaningful. From her heart- the one that still sobs over dad like I can't hear it across the hall at night, the one that kept me company before I was even born, the one that I slammed the car door on the other day. Mom wasn't being Miss Misty and she wasn't pretending to be on the Jersey Shore. She was mom. _My_ mom, and about to tell me something she's kept inside for far too long.

"I don't know what's going on, Tea, and I know I haven't always been there for you. When I had you, I was just a high school drop out. I wasn't ready to grow up, pay taxes, or be a mom. Hell, I'm probably still not. I know you've figured that out real quick. You've grown older than me, and a hell of a lot prettier too. You've always taken care of yourself since you were real young. You were raised by friends who support you through thick and thin. I don't have to monitor your texts or stalk your guy friends to know that they're a good bunch of kids. You did well, Tea. You're a hardworking girl with a job, you have the grades I never could've made, you're a dedicated dancer with trustworthy, loyal friends. And you've got a future. You did it all without me. I'm the one holding you back. I'm the one who you have to ask where I've been, who I've been hanging out with, why my clothes smell like smoke and cheap colognes.

I'm proud of you, Tea. I know you've never heard me say it, but I am. I'm jealous, but I'm proud. I want you to know how much it kills me when I think of all the dance recitals I've missed, how many moving up ceremonies I didn't show up to. I wish I asked where you were all those times you left and told you I loved you before you walked out the door. I've seen the stories on the news. I hear what they're saying about that Angeline girl- the one who killed her sister and then herself before they could build a case. The one the police keep thinking you had something to do with. But then I thought about their mother, poor Mrs. Everstone. That mother lost_ two _children. Two daughters she can never replace. So I thought about that pain, that loss, the place in a mother's heart that can never be filled again… what if that was you? What if that was my baby girl, my Tea? I could never live with myself if you died, Tea! Knowing I hardly knew you and your life was taken away from me before I could tell you how much I care!

I wish I knew you, my own daughter; your favorite color, your favorite movies, foods, what's going on in school, celeb crushes or the boys in your life, if you had your first kiss. I missed so much of your childhood, Tea, and for that I will never forgive myself. And now that I see you struggling- such a strong, beautiful young girl -I want to be here for you. I want you to know that I love you. So, _so_ much."

The car hasn't been moving. I think it's been that way for a while, but I can't recall. We are in the parking lot of the asylum. And I can't move. I was supposed to jump out of this car and find the answers I need to survive. I was supposed to have one of those bad-ass hero moments as I marched down the halls of an insane asylum on my quest for the truth. Maybe with a theme song or something. But instead, everything that was supposed to be so important about this visit and Fantasme and burning ballerinas- it doesn't matter anymore! I have seen too many deaths and horrors to think I can be startled again, but nothing is as doleful or as moving as my mother's tears. Everything is finally real.

"Oh, mom." my words gush out of me like the tears in my eyes. I practically leap from my seat just to reach over and hug her. She's surprised by this, I think, because she waits to hug me back. She gathers herself, grasps what's going on, and then places her arms around me too. This hug, despite the seatbelts and the armrest parting us, is just the cure I've been longing for. We cry together in the car a little while, letting time pass us by. If this is how I have to spend the last moments of my life then so be it. I want to hold onto her all through this struggle and all through the ballet. But then I think of what Summer told me.

_I can't let mom come to the ballet. I can't let her help me. Sekherta will…_

I don't mind the burning of my rash. I don't care to itch or touch it all. Maybe that's what the wound is for. Maybe there was a hole in Sekherta' heart that a hug from a mother just couldn't fill and that's why she killed. A corpse can't let go. A corpse can't say no or push you away. Their hugs would surely last for years to come.

"Mom…" I whisper through her thick bundles of hair, "do you believe in curses?"

"Hm? What do you mean, love?"

"I mean, what would you do if there were such things like evil spirits and curses? What would you do if they were somehow out to get you? To get me?"

She looks at me ardently before smiling. I never saw how beautiful my mother's smile was before now. Maybe it's because there's no globs of lipstick or because she's not making kissy faces, but it is dazzling. No wonder my dad fell in love with her.

"I would probably leave you here with the rest of the loonies, because that is the craziest idea ever. No girl as loved or as strong as you with so much to live and fight for, would _ever_ let something so dark overpower her." she leans in to place a gentle, un-glossed kiss on my forehead. "Now, do what you need to do. I'll wait here in the car."

"Right. Thanks, mom." I nod. I take one step out of the car before turning back to her. "Love you. And, if it makes you feel any better, you haven't missed my first kiss."

She smiles between tears.

* * *

><p>Half an hour of paper work, identifying, and interviewing later, a nurse leads me down a white tunnel. The lights have that awkward yellow tint to them, and of course there's always that one blue-ish light that just throws everybody off. Man, I hate that light. The nurse had to unlock several doors just in this one hallway alone and I can't even begin to fathom how many guards we've passed. You'd think we're trying to sneak into Area 51 or something. The whole place smells like vomit and bleach, and maybe a hint of that cold air-conditioning scent. My shoes stick to the floor like they've been cleaned so many times that they beg for dirt or germs.<p>

We pass door after door. Each one with some face locked away inside. I get the feeling that if Sekherta were alive today, this is where she'd be. Tucked away like an animal, her screams trapped behind thick metal doors. That is _if _she were caught. But anyways: we reach the end of the hallway, coming face to face with a great metal door.

The nurse, whose aged, apathetic face offers no hospitality, glances me up and down before reaching for the pile of bins by the wall. She holds it out to me, tapping her foot like I'm already taking up too much of her time.

"Remove all jewelry from your person; necklaces, rings, bracelets, earrings, piercings, watches. You're also going to need to remove your belt and any electronics. Remember to keep your voice down and act maturely and mannerly. There will be a guard stationed outside this door and one inside along with an audio security camera. You have fifteen minutes, and then she has to go back to solitary. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am."

I rush to place my belongings in the bin. I only have fifteen minutes to figure out a way to save my life. I'm not wasting a damn second. The nurse hands the bin to the guard and then swings around her belt of jingling, jangling keys. The lock ticking at its release sends adrenaline running through me. I've only ever seen photos of Fantasme primped and dolled in her stage costumes. I've never seen anyone dance with more grace, more perfection than she. Angeline was the same way; always so beautiful, seemingly perfect. She sparkled more than the rhinestones on her bodices, stood higher than her leaps about the stage. Yet now I can only think of that feeling when I saw her in the hospital. What if Fantasme too is scathed and chastened? It's like Angeline all over again!

The door swings open, and there she is. Fantasme Dvorzhetski. The greatest ballet dancer ever known, now sallow and sunken into the metal seats. The air is ill when I step in. I can taste disease. I can taste cleaning chemicals and a harvest of broken dreams. The nurse leaves me behind a three-inch thick door with a guard standing watch in the corner behind Fantasme. He lurks unmoving and shadowed.

"Well, well." Fantasme scoots in her chair with a snicker hidden somewhere in her voice. "It's been quite some time since I last had a visitor. An old fan perhaps? Look, I'll give you an autograph, but I highly doubt it'll be worth anything these days. Who's the new prima ballerina of the world? A Russian, I presume."

Fantasme is older than I thought. Wrinkles of stress and sleepless nights have irrigated new paths in her skin for tears to follow. Her long raven hair is unpolished and draped down around her like a stiff broom. Her tutus and tiaras have been replaced by the traditional patient garb- a loose grey shirt and some puffy black sweat pants. Yet her voice whips and her eyes burn like they did all those yesterdays ago. There is age and experience to her voice as it swings at me with fists of arrogance and scars of disdain. Scars I'm sure were born of Sekherta. There is such a life in her eyes, but not one of freedom and will. It's more like the leftovers of paranoia, of that lust to kill and to torture.

"Why, yes. It's Svetlana Zakharova." I squeak.

"Mm. Yes, of course. She can kick her legs up high and she has such a pretty smile, but that's just about all she has going for her. I could do so much better if… well, if I wasn't locked up in here." she smirks condescendingly. "Now, what is it that you want? I mean, you don't _look _like a ballerina- it seems you _have_ to wear a bra."

I take her insult in stride. To most that wouldn't seem very offensive. Yeah; I'm a girl, why wouldn't I want breasts? Well, because I'm a ballet dancer. That's why. From one professional ballerina to another, it's basically calling someone fat. Instead of saying something back- maybe trying to take a jab at her broken career- I stick my eyes right at hers. She's a little shaken by my sudden change in countenance, but doesn't seem intimidated in the least. My shy, obsequious persona is pushed behind a stark, demanding one. I sit up tall, and without a care about the male guard just a few feet away, I pull my shirt down enough for her to see the wound.

Then her eyes no longer stab. All spiteful scourges are lost from her scowl. She takes a wide-eyed look at the tender scab upon my breast. Somehow I can see the hauntings returning to her. All the memories she has tried to disgorge or cut out from her wrists are now presented bluntly before her. Her smirk, her callous glare is torn from her being all together.

"You." she shutters. "You come to mock me. You come to have her finish me."

"No." I state plainly. "I've come for answers. Answers only _you_ can give me."

At first she looks around. Never at me, though. She pleads for them not to peak at me. She toys with her fingers as they rest in her lap; pondering, contemplating on whether she is generous enough to help save me or not. Or, perhaps, simmering in the past that she's not seen in so long. Then she sharpens her look again. It's like Sekherta's. Dark, dark eyes that never blink. Never lose sight of their prey or wash away their poison. It stirs my nerves into fear and submission once more.

"Tell me, child, have you ever heard of stigmata?"

"Stigmata?"

"Yes. They say they are the fleshly wounds resembling those pierced through crucifixion. Jesus Christ's crucifixion to be exact. Some are brief rushes of blood, some are a variation in skin color, and some are just excruciatingly painful. They are open wounds, sores, and _rashes_. Sometimes ones that never quite heal." she speaks as though there is some cynical joy to all this. Her flashing looks warn me to die, and to do so quickly, if I wish to prevent a fate like hers.

"So are you saying that I have a divine wound or something?"

"Oh, hardly. If only it were so pure. No, no. What you bear above your heart is very much like a stigmata in that it is a wound of the past and of the dead. An ancient scar per se. Now, you seem to be a smart girl. So tell me, how does 'The Sands of Solipsism' end?"

I glare peculiarly at her, unsure of just what she's trying to get at.

"Sh-She…"

"Go on. It's quite alright to say the answer aloud if you know it." she teases.

"Well, after Sekherta sets her free, Kemat returns to the pharaoh where they live happily ever after."

"_And_?"

"And… Kemat tells Pharaoh about what Sekherta has done, and he sends his soldiers out to get her. They catch her at the Temple of Ra where she is killed."

"How, love? _How_ is she killed?"

"An arrow. The soldier… he shot an arrow through her heart!" my eyes spring to life. The wound on my chest is the one that killed Sekherta all those years ago. It is the ghost of the arrow that tore her from her life, brought the curtains to a close. Upon me it writhes, yearning to be scratched again with this realization. This time stronger than ever and I cringe at the pain. I bring my arms up over my chest, holding my hands so I don't scratch. It burns. It burns. It burns. Just ever so briefly, I see Sekherta's last moments. There's a shadow of a man with a bow and arrow cast upon the temple wall. I wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it…

"It feels so good to scratch it, doesn't it?"

I look up to see her hands gripped around the neck of her shirt and revealing the remnants of her wound as well. It's about the same size as mine, but clearer and quieter. Hers is a mottled blotch of skin like an everlasting bruise or a cadaveric livedo.

"It feels good to scratch, but at a cost. It's the most uplifting, serene pain. Pleasurable, intoxicating. You want more even though your peeling away your own skin, bleeding your own blood. You see visions. You watch her murder. But, God, you love it. Deny it as you will, you know how much you want that sin under your skin. That is how Amunet felt when she slit throats, when she drowned children, when the arrow pierced her heart. Such passion, pain, and pleasure all in one blow. Freedom in release, in control…"

"Amunet? I've heard that name before, it's-"

"Sekherta's real name. Nebet Amunet. Hemet Nesew Amunet. These are all names you may have heard her addressed as; 'Lady Amunet', 'Royal Wife Amunet'. The name Sekherta was given to Amunet by the man who first wrote 'The Sands of Solipsism', Dr. Pierre Gölöncsér himself."

"The archaeologist? But he…"

"Oh? So you know a little history, eh? Well, Dr. Gölöncsér was the one who discovered the tomb of Amunet. He and his team had been excavating the tomb for months before they came across her sarcophagus. And all throughout the maze of tunnels and traps, there were warnings that he did not heed. They told him never to open the wooden sarcophagus amongst gold ones. There were fifteen sarcophaguses in that tomb. Ten were empty, the bodies having been removed to protect them from raiders many years ago. But the wooden one remained in tact. Not a single treasure remained in the room where it was found, as if there were none to begin with. As if someone did not want whoever was interred there to enjoy their afterlife.

His team went inside. They began to pry open the sarcophagus just as the hieroglyphs above the entranceway caught his eye. It read; _'one who has entered here has not heard before. A final warning stands at this door. Leave what evil lie here all at rest, or so be cursed those who can not hear by she who can not see'_. He ran after his men, warning that they leave the sarcophagus untouched, but it was too late. Inside was the most hastily, disrespectfully wrapped mummy to date. There were no jewels, no fabrics, nothing but a caged body. Dr. Gölöncsér searched the tomb for evidence, for a name to give this ancient face. There wasn't a name- well, at least not a friendly one. She was addressed as 'kekewey' and 'khewu', ancient Egyptian terms for darkness and evil. However, he did find a story someways off in another part of the tomb. A worn, incomplete history of nebet-kekewey, Lady of Darkness, which we now know as 'The Sands of Solipsism'.

In his journal, which later became the foundation for the ballet, he had spoken of a spirit. The mummy itself did not move, but instead he found the ghostly image of a woman tearing her way out of the ancient tissues and bones. Then, when she opened her eyes, they never closed again. Many of the men bowed at her feet, cowardly pleading for their lives. The European men, however, had no such time for fairytales. That's why they were the first to die. Split apart, he wrote. Their bodies torn like a sheet of paper and tossed to the trash and without Amunet moving a finger. The men on the floor were next. The cowards; they'd somehow imploded. Or at least that's what he wrote in the journal."

"What about Pierre? What happened to him?"

"He met eye to eye with the cursed queen. And when he did not fear death, when he did not shutter at the black, dead eyes meeting his… she vanished. She did not blink, he said. Not once. Nor will she ever. They say she was cursed by the Egyptian Gods to never close her eyes again."

"But why?" I inch closer.

"Who knows. I believe it is because she was blind her whole life. So the Gods thought that if she couldn't close her eyes, perhaps she'd see life for what it truly is. Perhaps she'd see the light, or the truth, the error of her ways. I don't know. Whatever the reason, I'm not so positive it worked. I mean… here _we_ are and her eyes have still not closed."

"My dearest friend… his grandfather is an archaeologist. Almost all that I know about Egypt I learned from him. But I had no idea all that had actually happened. That's horrible." I hesitate to tell her anything about Yami. Would she even believe me if I did? I mean, she's in an insane asylum for crying out loud! Plus, she did go through the same things I am experiencing now. It's not like anyone would believe her if I told her about Yami, right? Maybe…

"So, you have a boyfriend. Oh, tisk, tisk. Amunet always finds them so… entertaining."

"Why would she want to harm those closest to us? Didn't she love the Pharaoh? Didn't she love Kemat? All she ever wanted was to be loved. Or, at least that's my feelings on the story. She was abused by her father with no control over her life!"

"I wouldn't say love. To think Amunet even understood what love is? Perhaps you should be here in my place for even thinking such a thought. No. Amunet was a serial killer. _That_ was her understanding of love. A corpse can not abuse you. A corpse can not fight back. She saw herself in those cadavers. She loved the idea of control. Finally she could take charge of something in her life; from the level of pain her victims suffered to how quickly or slowly they died, and then how to spend her time with the body. It's like… it's like bulimia in a psychological sense. In most cases, people with bulimia feel they have no control over their life. It's more a mental case than it is a physical one, because when they make themselves binge and purge, they feel they have control over their weight and what their body does. Or even rape! Rape isn't normally an act of sexual desire, but more about being able to feel that power of domination."

"That is what motivated her to do such terrible things?"

"For the most part. I suspect she would have felt that if she could not be loved, she would _make_ someone love her, if even in death. See, there are three categories of serial killers. Hedonistc, Visionary, and Mission-Oriented. Amunet is a hedonistic; someone who finds thrill in killing and outsmarting anyone who tries to catch them like it's a game. Amunet became addicted to the excitement of murdering, an adrenaline rush in causing terror and forcing her victims last breaths to be bloodcurdling screams. But she also sought comfort after the death. She loved the closeness of a human body, even if dead, probably because she did not have that growing up. And you can't just stop killing. It's like a drug. You need that next high, that next rush. That is what you've been feeling, right?"

I look birefly at the guard in the room. Hearing a solitary confinement patient a young teenaged girl discussing serial killers is probably pushing it for him. I can see his frustration; does he end this meeting short, or does he too want to hear how it ends? Maybe he thinks we're both crazy. I would. So he checks his watch and lets us continue to divulge.

I nod. "Yes. Very much so. I just… feel that dark need. Sometimes I imagine it so vividly, it feels real. And the blood always ends up on my hands. I'm afraid that soon I will hurt those closest to me. If I already have not…"

"It's that boy isn't it? The archaeologist's grandson?"

"Yes. I fear I have hurt him! He won't answer any of my calls, he-" I pause. The guard behind Fantasme begins to stir in his shady corner. He reaches for his belt, like maybe for handcuffs, the keys, something! I know my fifteen minutes are up, and so I lung over the table for Fantasme. Without even thinking, I've grabbed her arms and shiver at the feeling of them. Her wrists are covered with bumpy roads and turnpikes of cuts and scars. But, more importantly, there are burns. Skin folds and dark pink swells reveal the forensics of flames. She had once been at their mercy.

_My burning ballerina._

"I know him!" I let the words fall as they may. "Fantasme, you must believe me! The spirit of the Pharaoh still exists just as Amunet's does!"

"And you've seen him?" her blood rushes beneath my fingertips.

"Yes, yes! The boy! My friend! My boyfriend! He has the Millennium Puzzle and the pharaoh's spirit is sealed within."

The guard now stands right behind her, tugging on the back of the chair like if she doesn't stand up he'll just yank it out beneath her.

"Holy shit! Then you must talk to him! He can end this for everyone! He can lock Amunet away and no one will have to suffer as we do!"

"How?" I hold onto her for as long as possible. The guard uses his meaty hands to lift the old ballerina up and drags her towards the door. I try my very best to hang on, to keep up. "Please, sir, just a few more minutes. I need her!"

"Ma'am, you have to let go. Your time is up!"

If only he knew just how true that really was.

"No! Fantasme!"

The guard struggles against Fantasme as she reaches for me too. She latches onto the door, holding herself down while the guard tries to drag her away. I still have her wrist and refuse to let her go. She is my hope, my last chance. We both grunt and squirm, but we are no match when back up arrives on the scene. The guard who has waited outside the door now has to intervene. While one of them takes Fantasme, the other grabs me from behind and pulls me the opposite way.

"How do I stop it?" I barely breathe. "Please… how do I free myself of this curse? I don't want to die, Fantasme! You must help me!"

"Think!" she screams, pounding against the muscles of her guard. We are now what seems like miles apart in this hallway and keep getting pulled further. "Think of all her victims, and then of those she spared! Why do you think it feels so good to scratch that itch if it is the wound that killed Amunet? Be her! When the music plays, meet her at the edge of the stage as she had met the arrow!"

"Fantasme!" I reach, somehow thinking my arm will grow long enough to grab hold of her. Maybe to hug her. Maybe to tell her that someone cares. To say thanks. To know she was here, she was real, and that she's not crazy. The last I see of the once perfect, elegant ballerina, is her being swarmed by nurses, drugged, and screaming to be set free. Her screams hollow out the hall. Not even the several doors we pass can fully drown the sound. The guard escorting me out basically tosses me onto the steps like a pesky mutt. He shoves the bin of my belongings into my stomach and huffs his muscular self back inside.

A cloud of frozen breath collects around me. In the winter air, I can finally see how hard I have been breathing. I let the emotions tingle through me, hoping they'll settle somewhere. They don't. I'm awake. I'm alive. I'm excited. I'm scared. I just stare at the asylum doors for the longest time until mom honks the car horn.

"Tea!" she shouts.

I turn away, thinking I can still hear Fantasme screaming some words of wisdom. A last hope. A way out. Instead, there is only the snow whistling in the wind.


	14. Act 3, Scene 3: Who Will Listen

Act III, Scene III

Mother has made me breakfast this morning. Oh, and do believe me, I am trying so hard to enjoy it. For it is the first meal we've actually eaten together in so, so, _so_ long. We're actually seated at the table; mother with a mug of home brewed coffee, pancakes and eggs, and I with grapefruit and bacon. Whoever knew my mother could even turn on a stove? But with all that has happened, food bears little taste. It means nothing to me. I've lost all appetite, but I fight down some bacon and pick at the fruit so that mom doesn't feel bad. I can see how hard she's trying to make things right. And while cooking breakfast and pretending to be interested in what I'm learning in school won't make up for the past sixteen years, it is a start. Her food really isn't all that terrible anyways.

"So, ballet rehearsal today?" she pushes a cheery pitch in there.

"Yup."

"Opening night is getting closer and closer. You must be so excited."

"Really. I've never performed a lead role before."

"Oh, I know. My baby is moving up. Finally they're seeing your talent. It's about time."

I ignore that fact that she has no idea what ballets the company is even putting on and which ones I'm dancing in. She might know what time rehearsals start and end, but she has no idea what grueling torture happens in between. My quads just burn thinking about it. She can guess _The Nutcracker_, which I have the part of a snowflake for, but she's probably never even heard of _The Sands of Solipsism_.

"Yup."

"Am I aloud to come see you in the spotlight?"

I swallow hard on a piece of bacon that feels like a pile of ash catching in my throat. I want to tell her _'yes, that'd be awesome! You've never seen me dance before, and having you there means the world to me'_. But I can't. Because all I here is Summer's warning, her telling me not to let my loved ones come to the ballet. After our emotional day yesterday, I'm terrified that my denying her to come see me dance will send us back to our old routine; lonely TV dinners and silent car rides. I'm so caught right now that I actually wish I would choke just as an excuse for not answering.

But luckily there is another excuse. Three hard knocks on the door. Mom and I share a look and we're both thinking the same thing: "who in the hell is at our door this early in the morning?" Secretly, I'm hoping that it's Yugi. I'd give anything to see his face right now. That smile. Those eyes. To tell him how sorry I am for that thing that I did that I don't remember but I'm sorry anyways. Maybe I'm hoping it's Joey too. Or Tristan. A familiar face that has come to tell me they've got my back. Mom sets down her coffee and, shockingly, attempts to cover herself up before getting the door.

Although it's not Joey, or Tristan, or Yugi, or even Yami, there is a familiar face standing on my porch. Two faces to be exact. That porky detective and his haggard sidekick. They've come in their nice suits and axe body wash scents just to ruin what might have been a tolerable day- all things considered, even my impending death at tomorrow night's performance. _Stoked_.

"Good morning, Mrs. Gardner. We're sorry to bother you like this, but we're going to need to ask your daughter just a few more questions."

"Are you going to arrest her?"

"If need be- such as your or her refusal to cooperate with our investigation."

Mom looks back at me for permission. I really do not need this right now, but I suppose it's better now than never. Or, ok, never actually _would_ be better, but… whatever. I push away my plate and give the ok for mom to let them in, like this time I'm the mafia boss. Yeah. The mafia boss in baby duckie pajamas and some morning rat-nest hair. Clearly I'm one intimidating suspect. They should get the guns out. _Don't play!_

"Good morning, officers." I begin the conversation.

"Good morning, Tea. I know this isn't the best way to start your day, but this is really important. See, my partner and I our crunching time, so we'll try not to take up too much of your morning here."

"Much appreciated." I sound as joyous as Fantasme did when I first walked in the interrogation room. Cocky, annoyed, and hissing like a viper.

"Well, Miss Gardner, we understand that you went to talk to a Fantasme Dvorzhetski yesterday. Is this correct?"

"Yup."

"Ok. What's peculiar about that is Angeline Everstone arranged for a visit with the same patient just a dew days preceding her death. What can you tell me about that?"

I sigh, leaning over my elbow like I'm about to tell them a secret. And a real juicy one too.

"Fantasme Dvorzhetski was the last person to dance the main role in 'The Sands of Solipsism'; which, if you didn't know, is the primary ballet our company is working on. Angeline would have wanted to talk to her because… because she's also our last hope."

"Tea?" mom steps closer. "What do you mean, baby?"

"I mean, the role does stuff. It has been consuming us body and soul, and the only person who has danced the role entirely is Fantasme. If anyone would understand what we're going through, it'd be her."

"You do know that miss Angeline Everstone killed her sister Nathalie Everstone?"

"Yes, I've been made aware of that."

"I want you to listen to something for me, Miss Gardner, and I want you to listen to it real good. Because we're trying to figure out what it means, but we're having some toruble. Perhaps you could shed some light on the issue." the chubby detective pulls out a tape recorder from his pocket and sets it on the table. The way his voice tries to out 'arrogant' me makes my fists ball. Without even hearing a word, I jump when I see the recorder. Nerves zigzag around my body, worrying about all the conversations I've had in the last few days. Did I say something I shouldn't have? What if I let something slip? I swear if one of my best friends has been wearing a wire-

He presses play.

"_Well, well. It's been quite some time since I last had a visitor_." Fantasme's voice rises form the recorder. I'm so stupid! I had totally disregarded the camera and audio tape in the visitor room at the asylum! I was so desperate for answers, I didn't think about the tape or care about the guard. Ugh! I'm such a fool!

I listen to the whole conversation again. I hear about the stigmata, the story of Dr. Pierre Gölöncsér, and I even sit through the screams. I'm sure the part where we spoke of serial killers and Amunet's dismal lack of empathy would put me into handcuffs. For some reason that actually sounds better than to perform my death for an entire audience. My ears ring at the sound of Fantasme's frantic pleas, remembering how barbarically she'd been dragged down that hall towards solitary. I worried about her all night. Maybe Sekherta found her again and it was all my fault. I know I've only met the woman once, but I feel closer to her than anyone right now. I have to trust my life within her words. If I survive, there's got to be something I can do for her. She doesn't belong in that asylum.

"_When the music plays, meet her at the edge of the stage as she had met the arrow!_" was the last thing she said before the nurses charged in with their needles.

"Sound familiar?"

I don't answer. My mom steps even closer and this time winds a hand over my shoulder.

"Tea… what's this all about? What does all that on the tape mean?"

I'm cornered. The detectives have me behind bars at my own breakfast table, while mom may be having her first motherly panic attack. There's no way out.

"Angeline killed her sister because she was possessed." the words rip from my mouth. "She truly believed this, as do I. And then she was so struck with guilt and pain that she ended her life. I know this sounds crazy! Believe me, I know! I didn't accept it at first either. Yes, it's true that I was there when she killed herself. It's true that I was jealous of her- I don't know a single dancer who wasn't. It's true that I wanted her role more than anything. But I didn't kill Angeline. Amunet did. The girl you hear us talk about on the tape… Hemet Nesew Amunet… Angeline believed that that was the spirit who made her do all those terrible things. Fantasme believes it because she too was possessed by this spirit. And now I… I have been feeling things, seeing things, doing things that I can't put a reason to."

And that was the best defense I could muster. The sad part is that it's the truth.

The longest silence follows. Yes; it's even longer than the pauses on _Project Runway _to see who stays and who got eliminated. There's almost nothing to read from either of the detectives' faces. They stare crisply at me, then at the crumbs on the table, once at each other, and then back to me. Mom's hand has gripped tighter- though I'm not sure when. I think she's having a nervous breakdown and I'm surprised to see how well she's hiding it. Normally she's a lit dynamite and poised make a scene out of every mishaps around. Her silence just makes this moment cut even more.

"Thank you." says the detective with the slim face.

"What?" slips out of my mouth. There's probably an expression on my face to rival my question.

"Thank you… for giving us your understanding of the situation."

"You mean I'm… clear?"

The detectives nod. "Mhm. Forensics came back negative. Her wounds were all self-inflicted and her parents strongly believed you had no part in her death. There had been a lot of problems in their household long before any mention of you. You just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time."

I can finally breathe.

"Thank God." mom whispers loudly.

"The Everstones just wanted answers to why this all happened. And, personally, so do we. Two teenagers don't just die for no reason. We're not sure of just what to tell them." there is an honest sympathy in his eyes. I want to correct him, tell him that _three_ teenagers don't just die, but I keep my mouth shut.

Now, I highly doubt that there is the slightest chance of these detectives believing me. Instead they'll probably tell Mr. and Mrs. Everstone that their daughter had suffered some kind of psychosis and failed to receive treatment. This in turn will make her parents feel guilty. They'll be plagued by "what-ifs". They could be tossed into denial, repression, all sorts of stress disorders. How this is all supposed to give them closure is a mystery. And only now when I really think about it, how both of their daughters are dead, regardless of how snobbish, bitchy, or high-maintenance they were, how empty and melancholy they must feel. My heart truly goes out to them. Soon, my own mother may be able to relate to them.

"We thank you for your time." the other says as they stand in unison. Mom tells them to send the Everstones comforting words, gently ushering them out of the house as I had never seen her do before. I only sit and stare at the food I've scarcely touched. The hunger that bemoans within me is not for meager grapefruit or bacon strips, but for blood and torture. _Kill. Kill. Kill_. Nothing will satisfy me until that final moment of domination, when a victim's last breath is lost between puncture wounds in their lungs. I can not let that urge control me. I can not let Sekherta- I mean, Amunet- control me. That is the least I can do for Angeline's parents, for her sister Nathalie, for her.

While mom converses at the door, I push violently from my seat and head for my room. Where all this steam and anger came from is beyond me. But now that it's here, I want to revel in it. I want to be mad. I want to scream at the top of my lungs if it will let everything go. I fight myself into my clothes; some beat up pink leggings, the black leotard I never bother to replace, and a grey, free flowing shirt that hangs off my shoulders. All the while there are glimpses of Ancient Egypt all around. My mirror moves with the past, my posters whimper like murder victims, and flashes of Amunet pulling out the ribs of Sitamun crash all around me. I try to shake them off, too mad to bother with them. I shove my feet into some flats and throw a pair of pointe shoes into my dance bag before thumping down the stairs again.

"Mom, I'm going to be late for ballet." I hiss. She immediately spins my way. I'm still not used to seeing worry lines in her brow or nerves in her eyes. She asks me what's wrong but I tell her it's nothing. I tell her I'm just tired and stressed through gritted teeth. She drops the issue before I can snap any louder at her. And I really don't mean to. I don't want to be some bratty child when we've just come to a peace agreement. But maybe it's my way of pushing her away. Maybe I don't want her to feel bad when I die tomorrow night and so I have to get rid of her before Amunet does. Whatever it is, we don't speak about in the car ride to the theatre. We don't speak about anything.

* * *

><p>Truth is, I'm not late for ballet. I'm actually really early. But I want it this way. I want it to be just me and the evil queen like it was the other time I was early. Except this time I know what I'm getting into. I wave mom goodbye and watch as she pulls away. It is just as freezing, just as windy and unforgiving as it was last time. I know Amunet is with me in these icy breezes; I can hear them whisper and beg for death. I mount the steps and come face to face with the row of glass doors. The revolving ones in the middle that most visitors walk through are blocked off with a metal hatch. But these glass ones to the side are only locked, and I can still peer into the main entrance from them.<p>

"Come on, Amunet. Open that door again." I command to the snow.

A few moments pass by. I think this a total waste of time, my spark all burnt out, and now I'm just standing here in the cold like an idiot. Just as I turn to park myself on the steps, I hear the door unlock. It creaks open against the ice's will and hits the door to its side with a clang. I am met by that same darkness once again. Amunet welcomes me in.

I take one last gulp of harsh, winter air and step past the doors. My next breath is warm and dry. Instead of the Romanesque theatre, painted cherub ceilings, and French chandeliers, I am met by immense pillars, an alabaster floor, and an open view of a city in the distance. Torches struggle against the walls. Everything is filled with incenses and the scent of the wind running off of murky waters. There is much to entertain on the high walls around me. There are so many symbols I can not read, designs that I would never have the patience to paint. My footsteps slide and patter down this dark hall, crunching over pecks of sand blown in through the open walls.

I know where has Amunet has taken me. I am in Yami's old home- his palace. I am lost in the halls of his homely edifice, and suddenly I'm burdened with wanting to see him. Where would a pharaoh be at this hour? Where would my friend, my crush be at the moment the sun nestles into the horizon? I almost feel like I'm searching for him, although Amunet will hardly allow me a glimpse.

I wander as though I were still making my way towards the stage. I know I used to turn here where instead of this divan and plant, there were water fountains. The next hall was where the management offices used to be, not these tapestries or torches. I am guided only by instinct, only by the feel of where I think the stage should be. But where I am makes no sense. The shadows are bent and distorted. They're not where they should be.

I stop when I hear talking. Then banging. A tousle perhaps. Although there's no way for me to translate the ancient words being spat, I know they are not at all friendly. I turn the corner and enter a gentle room where it looks like one would drink wine and entertain guests. There are divans spread around the room and a few stands with empty jugs and chalices. Pillows of the finest fabrics are littered everywhere from the wrestling match that takes place by the grand window. Which, if you ask me, is hardly a window at all. More of just a large opening in the wall between pillars. A setting sun lurks between the two figures that fight each other at the base of one of the pillars.

They are two girls. It's hard to see their faces because of how close they are to each other's, how quickly and beastly they struggle against one another. Neither are servants, that is for sure. They wear golden headdresses, extravagantly beaded necklaces, and an array of bracelets, armbands, and rings. One girl is pushed up against the pillar, her hands clenched daringly around the throat of her opponent. I assume that one is Amunet. The other fights back, kicking, swatting, and choking for a plea in any way she can. I try to shrink into an invisible size and stay out of their sight. I wouldn't want either of them to direct that sort of aggression towards me.

Then, with a grunt and a most powerful heave, Amunet is able to push her rival back and off the edge of the palace walls. That is when my body lunges forth without my consent. I think that maybe if I hurry, I can catch this girl before her death. But then I remember that this is the past. This is already happened, and she is already dead. Nothing makes that realization more clear than the cracking, crunching, smacking sound that emanates from the window. Amunet leans over the side, eyeing the broken body below. I don't have to see it to know that it's there. I can almost smell the blood. I have to steer my thoughts away not to think of mangled limbs, backwards elbows, and blood seeping into the sand. All I need to know is that she's dead and there's nothing I can do about it.

But I don't listen. I run over to the edge and look. Something in me wanted to look, wanted to see a human all distorted and in pieces. I stare as ardently as the killer standing beside me. I can't take my eyes away. I am like Amunet. Now she lifts her head, in just the slightest, eeriest motion, and looks at me. Her reptilian eyes slither in my direction. They lock onto me, death freezing the very blood pulsing through me. Her eyes are the darkest black, while her Egyptian kohl does nothing but sharpen her innocent scowl. They see everything and yet nothing. They see through me, past me, in me. But the rest of her face is blank. Flawless nothingness that makes me want to forget the hellacious orbs beneath her brow. She has high cheek bones, a slight rosy tint to her caramel skin, and lips as pale as rose petals. There is a simple beauty glowing there on her face.

_This is surely why Pharaoh loved her most._

I realize that this is the first time I've ever seen her. I mean, _really_ seen her. Now in this memory, I stand face to face with the killer I have been so afraid of these past few days. And, really, aside from her bold and cruel eyes, she's not so scary. If I saw her on the street, I'd think she was just a normal girl. A lonely, lonely girl who could use some highlights and maybe mascara, but you get my point. I wonder about the sadness swirling there in the pools of her eyes. I wonder about the horrors they have seen, the tears they've cried. I wondered about who would have listened to them…

"Sedeb hat-ib." she says in a desperate croak. "Feka mudep keded. Akha sheta-ger, sesheh iawey sheni nekhet paraa." *

And then I am back in the theatre. The ledge of the palace is actually the edge of the stage. From here I can espy the entire room; the curved balconies, the entire length of the red carpeted aisles, every cushioned seat and chandelier. I can look straight over the orchestra pit. I stand on a taped X, placed there by Madame Thibeault during our last rehearsal. This is where I stand for the finale. It's where I spin my last round of fouettes, where I float in the spotlight of Sekherta's last moments. This is where I die.

I still want to be mad. I still want someone to hear me yell like never before. So, in the midst of nobody, I break down at the edge of the stage. My knees fold beneath me as I collapse onto the floor. Tears sweep over my eyes before I have the chance to stop them. And I scream. I scream at the only person who can hear me. _Me. _

* * *

><p>My legs are jelly after ballet. Today's rehearsal went from eight in the morning to eight at night. It was our final day of preparation. We all know where to stand for each sequence of the ballet. All our costumes fit snug and appropriately. We know how much time we'll have in between sequences. Tomorrow night is the big night, and I try to think more about how spectacular it will be instead of the finale that I know is coming. It's about the journey, right? Not the destination. That's what I tell myself. I repeat this over and over again as I walk home from the theatre.<p>

I insisted that mom not come and pick me up. I could brave the cold, the ice, and even the alleyway strangers if it meant walking down memory lane one last time. I could have asked Tristan- or dare I say it; Joey- for a ride, but I decided against it because of all the tensions. Yugi may have told Joey and Tristan what I've done. Even though I have no clue what it is, I can tell by how much they've been avoiding that it can't be good. Instead of troubling my last hours alive with stress and worrying, I opted to take a stroll through the city. It is so diverting with all the decorations and displays. Even in the summer there is plenty to do here. I guess that's why dad moved the family here when I was real little.

All of Domino is prepared for the festivities. The radio stations are playing nothing but holiday jingles, the shops are filled past capacity, and the lights that beam from skyscrapers, bridges, and even Kaiba Corps have jolly reds and greens. I breathe in the city air; bitten with snow and crusted with coffees and life. The winter chills my lungs and courses throughout my veins. Nothing feels more invigorating. And despite everything I know is soon to come, I want to join the mobs in shopping malls. I want to smile at the ice skaters and taste the samples of baked delights. A thrill from somewhere deep in side me emerges- one I have not felt since my days of believing in Santa Claus. I want to shop for presents, run through the snow, eat all the junk foods my ballet instructors forbid me to even smell!

So, seemingly without any blatant conscious thought, the first place I go is Kame Game. This shop is like another home to me. There's another family waiting for me there too. Another grandfather, another mother, and on a rare occasion there is another father. But most importantly, there is Yugi. I can't even begin to surmount all the memories I've helped paint into the walls. If there's any place that makes the picture-perfect holidays in the movies come to life, it's here. And I don't want to be mad anymore. I don't want to moan and grumble hateful words as I have been all day. I want peace. I want… Yugi.

I don't know what I could say to Yugi if I saw him. I don't know what I could do, what I _would_ do, if he were to come downstairs the moment I walk through the door. But I have to try. So I give the door a gentle push, and the bells lightly ringing above me spark Solomon's attention.

"Tea?" the old man perks up. He's standing on a ladder, trying to reach the boxes of games on one of the top shelves when I walk in. He's so busy smiling at me that he wobbles and loses his balance, falling backwards in a bit of a slow motion.

"Mr. Muto!" I dip for him, reaching my hands just beneath my arms in the knick of time. The old man weighs heavy in my arms, but safer here than on the floor. He sighs and wipes a bit of sweat from his brow.

"Oh my." he shakes his head. "That could have been dangerous. You young people sure have quick reflexes, and boy am I grateful for that."

"Are you ok, Mr. Muto?" I help him to his feet.

"Yes, yes. And thanks to you, my dear. Now, about those boxes."

"Here. Let me get them for you." I don't wait for his answer. I step up to the top shelf and grapple the boxes he almost died trying to reach. I follow all his orders of carrying them down carefully and placing them on the counter where he went on about why he needed them, who they were for. Stuff like that.

"Wonderful. Thank you, Tea. But I highly doubt you came here just to help out an old man. What is it that I can help you with, dear? Perhaps… you were looking for someone."

You really can't hide things from Solomon Muto. Maybe it's his age and experience, but he always seems to know what's up. I stare at the floor. I can't seem to bring my eyes to his, to tell him that I madly in love with his only grandson- though I'm he probably knows that part too. I want to ask how Yugi's been doing, if he said anything about what I'd done. And when I finally do meet his gaze again, he has a quirky grin and a cocked eyebrow like he knows something. That know-it-all smile is buried under his moustache as he nods for me to turn around.

"Yugi…"

* * *

><p><strong>Ok. So, in this chapter you saw Amunet speaking Ancient Egyptian. While I have taken baisc courses in the reading and speaking of Ancient Egypt, I do not hold those words to be 100% accurate. I tried to make the as accurate as possible, though. And they will be understood in later chapters (thanks to our wonderful Solomon Muto!)<strong>


	15. Act 3, Scene 4: I Saw What You Did

Act III, Scene IV

Frozen. Everything I thought I'd say to him is flying out the window. Everything I planned to do- hug, kiss, hold him- seems all too like a distant dream. I don't do any of that. Ok, more like I don't do anything period! There is no dramatic moment when we reunite and leap into each other's arms. I mean, I never really expected there to be, but I didn't think that so little would happen either. I can't move, can't think, can't breathe. It's Yugi. A mere two days without contact with him and it feels like I've been waiting for him to return from war. Always worrying. Always thinking thoughts that shouldn't be thought.

He stands in the doorway looking back at me. At first he seemed just as surprised to me as I was him. But now another expression adorns that gentle face of his. It'd be wrong for me to say he isn't happy to see me, but I don't think it's too far off from the truth. He looks at me distantly, almost warding me off in the best way his violet, warm eyes can. Something has changed about him. Were his shoulders always so broad? I always thought those shoulders were something Yami brought out whenever they switched places, but maybe I've been wrong the whole time. Because here he is before me- Yugi, not Yami- with weighted, sharpened shoulders that look like they could give me all the strength I need if I could only rest on them.

"Yugi." I say again, hoping he'll strike up a conversation so I don't have to ask the obvious question. He doesn't. Mr. Muto too can feel the wobbling of my nerves, the tension that is crippling the air.

"Yugi, my boy. Come get warm, huh?" Solomon comes around the counter with a jolly, trying smile beneath his grey moustache. "And Tea's even come to visit us. Isn't that nice of her? I know! Let's all sit in the living room where we'd be more comfortable-"

"More boxes just came in." is the first aching thing that comes out of Yugi's mouth. "I think I should go and get them."

My heart takes a tumble. Yugi doesn't even look at me when turns back towards the door! All my insides are screaming for something, while my head pleads not to make a scene. But I can't _not_ do that. It shouldn't even matter anymore! This is probably my last night to live so there isn't any time for propriety and planning. If anything is going to happen to night the way I want it to, I have to do something on my own. My heart pounds and pounds with each step Yugi takes towards that door. It almost feels like it's happening in slow motion, and I can't believe how long it takes me to actually do something! To actually say something so simple as this:

"_I'm sorry_!"

And as predicted, those are the words that do us both in. He stops, the door creaked open enough to let a litter of snowflakes fly in. When he looks back to me, his face is a mirror copy of mine. Guilt, sorrow, and pain is weaved around our faces. Our frowns feel droopy, our eyelids heavy, our eyebrows achingly arched and distraught. The air between us whimpers the words we so desperately need to say, but it freezes with the winter air sneaking past the door.

"I'm sorry." I say again, this time in a choked whisper. "Look, I… I wish I knew what else to say. I wish I knew what I was doing, but… this is all I have. And I mean it with all my heart, Yugi. I'm sorry."

He closes the door with a deep breath and puts his head down. His eyes close in contemplation: perhaps on what to say to me, perhaps to drown me out and seek Pharaoh for advice. Whatever the reason, I leave it to him to decide. I'm not even going to entertain the idea of pushing him into telling me what happened. The last time I ever saw him like this was when he "lost" a duel to Kaiba back in Duelist Kingdom. It broke my heart to see that then, and it still works now.

"Do you know what you said to me that night?" he finally speaks. I breathe in and bite my lower lip. My full attention is on him, giving him the signal to continue on. If fifteen customers were to storm in right now, I probably wouldn't even notice. Or care for that matter. This is what's happening now. This is where the pieces of my heart are falling. This is the moment where I'll remain.

"You may think I'm just being stupid, or even a jerk for avoiding you. You may think I'm blaming you as if I don't know that it was Sekherta controlling you that night. But you must understand that the words that came out of your mouth- in your voice.. Were the words I have been so afraid of since I met you."

He doesn't need to say much more. Tears are already stinging my eyes. I know what he's talking about. But still I let him go on. I have to, no matter how much it pains me. I know it pains him more to have lived it.

"You asked me how someone as weak and as short as I am could even think there was a chance you'd ever be with me. You asked me why I never gave up liking you, after explaining how socially awkward I am, how I obsess over games you find nerdy and a waste of time. You asked me why I still keep the Millennium Puzzle even though I can never measure up to Yami. And I've always known, Tea. Somehow, I've always known deep down that it's not me that you like. It's him. You stick around me just so you can see him again. And I guess I can understand why. He's so much stronger than I am. He- He's braver, faster, _taller_. Who am I… compared to him…"

"Yugi-" I try reaching for shoulder, but he shifts away.

"Which is why you did what you did. Or, Sekherta rather… but…. Still I was there, Tea! I watched it all happen before me and no matter how hard I tried to tell myself that it wasn't _really_ you, that it was Sekherta possessing your body, I- I just couldn't. It was _your_ body and…. What I saw happen that night was the nightmare I never wanted to be real. It was the truth I had known and feared all along… and I could do nothing but watch."

Although I have a pretty good idea where this is going, I say nothing of my suspicions. I don't want to. The spoken words of the cruelties I have bestowed upon my beloved Yugi would turn to stone around me. I'd wall myself up with the heavy words, hating just how real they are. Instead, I let instinct pull me. I breathe in a breath of Amunet and her sick, sick games. I know what she wants me to do. Now, instead of granting me visions of all her murderous triumphs of the ancient past, she plans to gift me a new vision. A modern vision that I help create. I let the wound on my chest sizzle to its breaking point. I'm so used to the feeling that I hardly cringe anymore. And now my cravings for the Millennium Puzzle consume me and call me.

Gently, I cup the golden artifact in my hands. Amunet's spirit races inside me. It's like a little girl whose all too excited to open the presents on her birthday. She's wanted this since she first discovered the Pharaoh's spirit still existed in this world. If anything, this is the very item that made her seek me out before I even had the lead role. It's a horrible realization when I think about it. The reason I danced so well for Madame Thibeault when Angeline was missing wasn't because of any real talent that I may have had, it was because Amunet wanted the quickest way to the Pharaoh. Seeing this around Yugi's neck the day I brought him to ballet rehearsal brought back so many memories for her. It reminded her of why she was still here, why she died, why she lived. I didn't get the role of Sekherta because I was good, I got it because I was possessed before I even knew there was a curse. I got it because Amunet wants to use me to destroy the Pharaoh.

"_Even my ballet career is a lie_." I pout in my head.

It seems like forever that I have been staring at the puzzle nesting in my palms. Yugi's breath sweeps down my neck and weaves between my hair. I've forgotten how close we stand together.

"Tea…" he says softly.

"Amunet will show me."

He nods with consent from Yami; "Show _us_."

His fingers lace over mine. Tingles ignite all throughout my hand, rushing zigzaggingly into my reddening cheeks. I look back at him in a way that I hope reads as a warning. Amunet's visions are never kind and I don't know what I'd do if he ever saw them. But he looks back too with twice the power. Yami's presence is here too, looking back at me without fear of Amunet. How I envy them. We hold the puzzle together as one. We take a breath. Our eyes close. And we are swept out of our minds and into Amunet's.

* * *

><p>After skimming through many lesser memories- hurried images of people walking through palace hallways, sped and jumbled conversations with a girl who reminds me of the Dark Magician Girl, and quick flashes of a thick, tattooed man yelling violently- Amunet settles me down into a still memory. She places me back into two days ago. Everything is smeared, but I can still make out my kitchen and living room. Yugi and I are sitting on the floor of the kitchen again, our words muffled beneath the smudge of the memory. This must be how Amunet saw it, watching us converse from a ghostly fog. She had stood and watched me cry in Yugi's arms, telling him about my murderous urges and the visions I've been having. The whole time she was never far away from me. Which is completely unnerving when I think about all the other times she could have been standing right behind me with those killer eyes and I didn't even notice.<p>

She shows me what happened upstairs in my room again- probably just for the fun of it. She makes me watch myself come running down the stairs after witnessing another bloodcurdling illusion and collapse onto the sofa. This is where my own memory fades and the quality of Amunet's clears. Time flies perfectly by. Yugi and I are speeding blurs as we shift positions throughout the night. One moment we're sitting on the couch watching Kung-Fu Panda, and then we're falling asleep to some infomercials around three in the morning. Yugi had moved to the other sofa and long since been snuggled in when my body began to stir. I don't recognize myself as I watch my own body from afar. I sit up gracefully enough, but my eyes are an intense black.

My fingers curl and crack like Amunet were stretching out her talons. Everything about me looks stiff and broken. She scans over my body as if deciding whether it were adequate for use. They way she lobs my head and cranes my neck towards Yugi is plenty unsettling. It's as though she can smell blood pulsing tranquilly through his little body. She slips from the covers and creeps towards him as polished and light as a hunting feline. Her shoulders hunched, her back elongated and arched. She looks over him with unwavering sight, debating where to start first. She purses her lips in a tight grin when she pulls away the blankets from Yugi.

"Oh. Paraa…" she coos motherly when the Millennium Puzzle reveals itself to her. A smile comes tenderly across her face- _my_ face- though her eyes are still devouring her prey. To my surprise, when I think she is going to sink her teeth into him, she instead rests her head on his chest. She brings her hand up and down his slender muscles, always coming back to the gold pyramid to caress its features. And she just breaths there for a little while; an ashy, childish breath from beyond the grave. I may just be bold enough to call it innocent the way she ogles the treasure chained around Yugi's neck.

"Imi-ib." her words fly quietly, like she were talking through the cobwebs and dust that had been their nest. And the way these words flutter helplessly is enchantingly heartbreaking. I want so very much for this measly, delicate croak of hers to be the flash of virtue in her soul. I want for that raspy little word to prove some humanity in her. She Can't be all bad if this is the sound of her heart's pleas! This can not be the _nebet kekewey _- "Lady of Darkness"- whose tomb warns of a plague so dark and evil that warnings need be marked everywhere near it. Can within this longing, empty voice be the killer I have feared all this time? Her voice, even in everyday speech, sounds like it was born of unrequited screams. She says this "imi-ib" with vocals that have been destroyed by choking on tears, holding back pleas. Had no one before now ever heard such a miserly sound?

_Imi-ib_. The word quivers within me. I look at her draped over Yugi. Her hand traces the art of Millennium Puzzle. I see an empty shell. I see how black her spirit's presence has made my eyes. I see how they don't blink. I see how she sees what she never had and never will. And I know what it means: _Imi-ib_. My love, my dear one, my heart's desire.

And just as swiftly as this light in her appeared, it then vanishes. A darkness grows- an angry one, even, that some light had pierced its thick, malignant veil. So because Amunet could never have the pharaoh back again, because maybe she never had him at all, because death and violence was her only understanding of love, she tiptoes her fingers up his chest and towards his neck. A grunt and growl come menacingly from some demon hidden in her throat when she feels her fingers around the meat of Yugi's neck. The feeling must do wonders to her lust, because she stands, loving it just a little more. I reach for her in an attempt to pull her off, but I slip right through her. This is only a memory, but I feel so pathetic just standing here when this horror is unfolding.

Like how Yugi felt watching what happens next…

A hand smacks against her wrist. It startles the hungry killer, but not enough to cower and retreat. Having very little trouble in prying her claws out of his flesh, Yami wakes in Yugi's body. His daring and sharp eyes glare coldly. _No one _hurts his host and friend. He stands ready to defend Yugi in any means necessary. With Amunet's wrist still in his grasp, he twists her arm and brings her downwards to her knees. I can feel the burn where his hand was those two nights ago. I mean, it was still _my_ body even though she was controlling it. And, might I say; _owey owey ow! _Yami don't play!

Yet Amunet only giggles between snorts of pain. What hurts my arm like hell right now is a only a game to her. She moans and moans, trying to make something of the greedy sound. Slurs of consonants and syllables that hardy fit together is the best attempt she makes to sound sane. It's not working in the slightest. And it's not because she speaks Ancient Egyptian that it doesn't piece well, it's that she sounds totally drunk. No, maybe not drunk… but hungry. Lustful. _Animal_. And I know what that means: _Kill. Kill. Kill._

"You are not, Tea!" Yami speaks punishingly. "Then you must be Sekherta. What do you think you're doing in her body?"

"Paraa." she groans. "In kesi-a. Abi kekewey a'at mes-en senef."

Where did that pretty, doleful voice from before go? She speaks now as if there is only hate in the world. Between moans and grumbles, this aching, rusting thing is her excuse for a tone of voice. Yami looks slightly away with notable frustration. The poor guy can't even remember how to speak his mother's tongue. Moreover, no matter what he tries saying to this lunatic, it won't mean a damn thing to her. I can't say Yami has always had a way with words, but I know how hard he tries to at least reason with people. Apparently words aren't going to solve any of this drama.

"I see." he says solemnly. "It seems this is going to be harder than I thought."

But Amunet doesn't give him another chance to figure things out. She swings her free hand up and snatches the Millennium Puzzle, pulling Yami down with it. She heaves him onto the hardwood floor and knocks over the coffee table as she goes to straddle his waist. All the while she is mumbling some junk in Ancient Egyptian. She's the only one with any real clue as to what she plans to gain from this. Yami struggles against her, doing his very best to keep her at a distance. He has her arms again, pushing them away and she tries pushing against him to with some gruesome lust to touch him. Thankfully he's able to overpower her. He shoves her off and she roars with disdain. She thirsts as a wolverine who can not get to her prey. I don't know how Yami is able to stay calm- well, calm enough. I would have peed myself if those unmoving eyes saw me as an enemy.

Yami is quick to get up, but Amunet stays on the ground. She curls up with her knees pulled in and her hands gripping tightly to her hair. My hair! Oh, I swear if she pulled any out, it's done. Over! She whimpers for a moment. Ok, not like she's hurt or she's whining, but kind of like she just _really_ wanted to kill him right then and there and now she has to try something else. And she does. Amunet may not have much empathy, but she sure has a great understanding of human emotion. She's also quite the actress. A deadly combination. Before Yami can decide what to do with her, she uncovers my face to reveal my big blue eyes. She pretends to go limp as if her spirit has left my body, and what's even scarier is that she uses my exact voice to question the events that have brought me to the floor.

Her deception settles in and Yami helps me stand.

"Ph-Pharaoh? What happened?" she asks believably. "I…. you… oh, what a terrible nightmare. She showed me those visions, only this time there as nowhere to go. I just saw them again and again and again! So much blood…"

"It's over now, Tea. You're awake. Sekherta must have gained control of your body to attempt to kill Yugi."

She trembles. ""Oh this is all my fault. Is he alright?"

"Yes. He is awake now and unharmed."

"Good. I would never forgive myself if-"

"It's alright. I won't let anything happen to my friends." he smiles. Hearing those words, even from a memory that doesn't belong to me, makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. Yet there is something odd about it. I mean, yeah, Pharaoh would totally say something like that. He's done so before. But this time… there's something cold. Something like a threat. Maybe he's not as blind as Amunet would like.

Amunet smiles back with a merry sigh. She places a hand over his and pulls him slightly towards her.

"Could… could you come upstairs with me? I'm still a little scared."

He looks hard at her. He knows upstairs is right where she wants him to be. The King of Games has played enough games to recognize a trap, but he decided to spring it anyways by nodding reassuringly to her. With a tiny giggle that makes me gag- _I mean, come on. I would never do that_!- she pulls on his hand and leads him up towards my room. All the while I just have this ugly feeling in my stomach. I feel disgusting and used. Once in my room, Amunet closes the door nicely behind her. That's when I know nothing good is about to happen. She's grinning so cruelly and yet so sweetly that if she were to stab me right now, I still wouldn't be able to call her a murderer as I bled out. Just a pretty nobody.

Yami looks around. There's no way out. Amunet is standing in front of the door, lightly clicking the lock on it. The windows are too high up. The walls are closing in. The look on his face- he knew he shouldn't have attacked that face down card. Amunet storms towards him wildly.

"Tea, what is it that you-" Yami whips around, his words cut by my lips upon his. She uses my body to push herself up against him, my fingers to keep his face near hers and burrowing in his black, blonde, magenta hair. Her mouth orchestrates around his. He hardly has time to breath. That sickening dread inside me tightens. It is the noose around my insides, the guillotine in my gut. All I can do is watch my impossible fantasy take anchor in Amunet's clutches. It's strange, really. This is almost how I imagined it, and yet those arms around him, those lips pressed against his, those legs sliding between his, they're mine. Yet they are not.

She guides him down onto my bed. Is it sad to think that while he's netted in Amunet's feisty make-out session, I'm hoping he doesn't notice how messy my room is? There's clothes on the floor that probably stink from ballet rehearsals. I have make up stains all across my vanity and papers on every tabletop and bookshelf. My bed is a horrible compilation of childhood fandom and girly dollar-store goodies. Despite all of that, they keep rolling and pulsing over my flower pillows and smiley-frog bed sheets. Amunet gets a nice grip on his jacket and begins peeling it off him.

"T-Tea! I… you… We…" he's finally able to come up for air.

"Yes, pharaoh. You. Me. Us." a pleasing giggle dribbles down her mouth.. She firmly grips his thigh with a suggestive hand, and the illusion is gone. It doesn't matter if Yami thinks it's me or Amunet seducing him, that touch is what sends him spiraling down. His natural instinct kicks in the higher she reaches. I think for a moment- for just a moment- he wants to go further. Let it all go. He wants to enjoy a feeling he's not felt in so very, very long; the touch of a woman's sultry, undulating body beneath him, the rush of absolute pleasure coursing through every nook and cranny of the body.

She guides him through everything. She knows exactly what she wants and where. So she moves his hands to her hips where she wants him to hold, lays him down into the blankets and weighs more of herself on top. Neither of them are shy or modest. It just looks so natural, so right. And when these little, light moans slip from her mouth, he livens with them. They move like a dance where only they know the counts. A seductive, skin-throbbing pas de deux. Then Yami takes the lead, slipping out from beneath and stands above her. He helps her out of her shirt- my silky Dark Magician Girl tank- and so eloquently moves in to kiss her. My own skin tinges with freedom and life when his fingers wash over her sides and hips.

"Pharaoh." she sucks in a breath of lusty air. It sounds like it tastes so good. She says this again and again. The further down his kisses slide, the more desperate the sound. By the time he reaches her navel, she switches from saying _pharaoh_ to _paraa _again. Although it means the same thing, it makes the difference between Yami cutting this short and me unknowingly losing my virginity. I can finally exhale. Yami shoves away. _Far_ away.

"No. This is wrong." he shakes his head. "I… I shouldn't have gone this far. I don't know what came over me. This is all wrong."

Amunet reaches again for his touch. "No, please stay. What's wrong?"

"This. Tea is Yugi's is most treasured friend. He loves her- you with all his heart. And here I… almost stole you from him."

"Yugi?" she spits. "Yugi? You think I care about Yugi? Pharaoh, don't you see? You're the one I love! What chance does that Yugi ever have of being with me? He's so preoccupied with those nerdy card games, his social skills are degraded, and moreover he's so unsually short. What girl in her right mind would be attracted to that? See, Pharaoh, you're the one that I want. You should know the reason I've stuck with Yugi for so long was all for you."

A wicked chortle rings from her eyes. But Yami in not amused in the least. He can not sit here and listen to me, her, whoever talk about his dearest friend like that. There is a cruel, sick look to his demeanor, and yet I think he's somewhat pleased to hear me speak about him in such a way. Could it be that the pharaoh secretly cares for me too? But in the end, my beloved, just, and fair Yami doesn't give in. Not even the most seductive, illustrious woman in time can corrode his loyal nature. Picking up his jacket, he takes one sweep through his hair before pushing off the bed. I can't tell if he's going to punch me dead in the face or strike with another passionate kiss. Amunet reaches for him again but is denied.

"Maybe… we could have been…." he shakes his head to erase the thought. And in one shadowy, collective move, he snakes past the threshold and enters the cold winter's night.

"Pharaoh!" she calls. But he is already gone. He leaves behind a seething Amunet. That demonic glint returns with the vengeance. Amunet is no longer human; only a body that hunts to feed, a mouth that kisses like a starving cannibal.

She finally lets loose a terrible, monstrous howl. The demons course through her vocal chords, setting fire to them as she breaths, and quaking any nearby ear drums with all the hate a thousands-year-old spirit can contain. And it's _my_ voice that breaks and snaps into her distraught. She throws herself at the wall, and the vanity. She throws everything that can break, heaves everything that can be lifted. I have never seen anything so frightening. I shutter and tremble in the midst of her rage. There has to be pain in in. There has to be a heartbreak somewhere deep in her breast. There has to be a reason Yami got away…

I think it's because she loves him. And, this time, not with knives.

* * *

><p>Yugi and I still stand exactly as we were. Our hands are still entwined over the Millennium Puzzle, our faces are still so near. Solomon now walks over to us and puts a hand on each of our shoulders. It's this new human touch that ignites chills into our beings and makes us both leap away. We breathe heavy like we've been just holding our breaths, staring at the Millennium Puzzle in the middle of a game shop like two idiots. I'm not sure if I can say anything about what I just saw. I'm not sure if I want to. What <em>was<em> that? An action-horror-porno? Yugi remains silent as well, so I feel safe in assuming he's on the same page as me.

Solomon gives us two good look-overs and pats- _more like smacks_- our backs again.

"What's the matter you two? You act like you've never seen mysterious visions from another time period before!"

"Sorry, gramps." Yugi rubs his back, though probably not sure what to be sorry for. He is the one getting abused! As the old man heads back for his counter, Yugi and I share a deeper look at each other. It's kind of weird how I never actually realized how grown up he is. Yeah, he's shorter than most guys our age, but those eyes. I think there's a lot more to them than their friendly, playful first glance. Now that I've cut him in a place so tender, I can see that better now than ever. I can't help but wonder if we will ever be the same, if we'll ever be able to get back to being our usual selves. Well, I'll be dead, but you know what I mean. We want to say everything, and yet nothing. Talking about the vision will surely poke more holes in what is already so fragile.

"Mr. Muto," I inquire, moving maturely over to the counter, "you know a great deal about Egyptian history, right?"

"Why, yes. These old bones have even seen a few excavations if you'll believe it! Why the sudden interest, may I ask?"

"Then would you know anything about the language of Ancient Egypt then? Like, if I were to say a sentence, you would know what I mean?"

"Most likely. See, there really is no set in stone form of the language spoken in Ancient Egypt. Most of the words we know today are a jumble of different vocabularies from different eras and dynasties. But it works mostly the same."

I pause, wanting to taste the sin the slips out of every consonant Amunet speaks. I remember her words. If I could only get my mouth to shape them:

"Sedeb hat-ib. Feka mudep keded. Akha sheta-ger, sesheh iawey sheni nekhet paraa."

The two stare wide-eyed. It's like I have transformed into a queen with the way I have mastered these words. They rose from my mouth, carried by a commanding, sultry voice that could have enticed Yami as Amunet did. Despite any dark meaning they may have, I feel pretty damn accomplished. This must be how Amunet feels: so refined, so melodic, even when slitting someone's life from their throat.

Yugi comes besides me, his gaze a little stark with fear. He must know what I said and suddenly I don't feel so proud of myself. I know Yugi's been learning from his grandpa since he was little, even if it wasn't always intentional. So I'm not surprised he's picked up on the Egyptian language. But Solomon is different. He knows each and every word I spoke. That's why he's shaking his head in utter dismay, looking down at the floor as if my soul is too bleak for living eyes.

"Oh, no." he mutters. "No, no, no."

"What?" my heart races. "What is it? What did I say?"

"Sadness. Slaughter. Scratch. Destroy. Pharaoh. It means something about having sadness that returns as slaughter. It should feel good to scratch the emptiness, and destroying the strength that surrounds pharaoh." Yugi pieces together the words he knows. Even without the eloquent translation, the big picture is starting look pretty clear.

"Is there anything else?" Solomon asks. I think carefully, bravely diving into each memory. Amunet often spoke very little. There had to have been something else, something she maybe whispered or mumbled. To me, to Yugi, to… to Yami! As she was forced onto her knees when they quarreled, Amunet _did_ speak! She said, she said um… she said…

"In kesi-a. Abi kekewey a'at mes-en senef."

"_I bow to you. I am darkness born of blood_. Tea, my dear, where on earth did you hear such things?"

It is my turn to look down as if I ashamed to admit it. Well, I kind of am.

"The curse… of 'The Sands of Solipsism'. I am haunted by the spirit of Queen Amunet."

"Nebet-Kekewey?" he jumps as much as a brittle old man can. "Tea! You- How? Do you know who she was?"

"Yes, sir, I do."

"And it seems she wants to use Tea to destroy the spirit of the Pharaoh!" Yugi adds fearfully.

"Up until a few days ago, I was foolish enough to admire the ballet story. A misunderstood, crazed queen who murdered anyone who stood in her way of being with pharaoh, of being his queen and his love. And the love that bloomed between the most powerful man in all the ancient world and a mere servant girl. Once I finally had the lead role of Sekherta, the new name for Amunet, I learned of the true story. How it is so darker than what violins and tutus can portray. So much, _much_ darker."

"Ah, but there is hope, Tea." Solomon lifts my chin with a warm, wrinkled hand. It's true that his eyes are lit with wonder and, yes, hope. Something I have not seen in so very long. He smiles simply. "Do you know about her tomb? About the maze of warnings and traps surrounding it?"

"Y-Yes. The team of archeologists ignored them and opened her sarcophagus anyways. Everyone except for Dr. Gölöncsér died."

"That part is true. But I think you're missing a very important detail, my young ballerina. See, Amunet's tomb never had any writings of any sort. At the time of her burial, the queen after her asked that nothing that could condemn Amunet's soul be written. Therefore, the tomb painters wrote nothing, as there was hardly a good word to paint about her either. There were never any treasures placed in her tomb, and certainly no markings as long as _that_ queen ruled. We know this because of that bit of information I told you before. The language of Egypt changed all the time. And with the help of carbon-dating, it was found that Amunet's mummy, the sarcophagus, and the walls themselves were there centuries before there was any writings on them."

"Which means," says Yugi, "the people must have waited long after the death of the queen and pharaoh to even think about writing warnings and prophecies on the tomb. Most likely, the death of Amunet wasn't a secret to anyone and the people probably turned it into some ghost story for generations after. Then they'd really want to make sure Amunet never came back and decided to finally place warnings there."

"Exactly. But the hope is this, Tea. The queen was nice enough to remove any ill name of Amunet for as long as she could. Do you know who that queen was?"

"Kemat. The servant girl." the name rushes out of my mouth before my mind can a hold of it. Kemat was the queen after Amunet- I know _The Sands of Solipsism_ well enough to figure that. How could I have been so blind all this time? The servant that Amunet loathed for falling in love with the pharaoh rose from the filthy lower class to the polished, golden throne. In the end, Great Royal Wife Amunet was succeeded by a peasant.

"Mhm. Amunet's own handmaiden took to the throne after winning the pharaoh's heart. The servant whom Amunet abused, beat, broke, and bashed. And this girl, who had every right to damn her for all eternity, who had every reason to hate her, did not. It is said that she was once Amunet's victim. And the ever-feared killer let her go, let her become a queen, let her be loved and be happy and free. And the queen did not dowse any hope for happiness in Amunet's afterlife."

"Why? Amunet nearly killed her! She abused her beyond repair!"

"Because Amunet was born a person."

* * *

><p><strong>Hey, lovelies. <strong>

**So sorry these updates are taking so long, but I have great news! Well, ok, maybe not great, but whatever. There is one (possibly two) chapters left! TA-DA! Congratulations on making it this far! ****But I'm working on two new stories for you! Yes, one will be Vaseshipping- can't get enough of that- and the other is (dare I say it? I feel sort of ashamed): a YamixOC. UGH I know! Why, Raving In The Rain? WHY?! How dare you make a canonxOC fic! Now you go to milkshake prison! Yes, I feel a little bad, but I'm trying so unbelievably hard not to make a Sue! Please don't hate me now, loves! I have only good intentions! I think...**

**Anyways, hope you're all having a wonderful summer! Next update may be a while because of cheerleading camp, but I'll try my best for you!**


	16. Act 3, Scene 5: It Came Crashing

Act III, Scene V

_Born a person_, he told me. _Amunet was born a person_. I remember standing there as Mr. Muto explained it all; how once upon a time, Amunet could have been a girl like me, or even Angeline and Fantasme. Amunet could have ruled at Yami's side, just as fair and virtuous as he. Amunet could have smiled and laughed and danced and conversed. But she didn't. She sobbed and ached and broke and beat. Queen Kemat was closer to her than anyone. Before she was queen, she was Amunet's handmaiden. While she braided her hair, fixed her pillows, painted her kohl, fastened her jewelry, the words that would have passed between the two of them probably had more heart than any of Pharaoh's commands. And who better to tell than someone like Kemat, a servant who had to keep your secret or else lose their lips. Or worse.

Mom is out picking up some dinner- Chinese, I think she said. Wasn't quite listening. I don't think my mind made the walk back with me from Yugi's place on this snowy night. It must have been left there beside Mr. Muto, still trying to wrap itself around everything that he said. _Born a person_. _Kemat, who had every reason to damn her, did her best to protect Amunet from the bowels of Ammut the Devourer_. I'm sure in thinking that Solomon's words have something- if not everything- to do with what Fantasme said too. _Meet her as she had met the arrow. _But how does one meet an arrow? I'd be terrified, knowing that my death is right on the tip of it, feeling it plunge through my heart where the rash still burns. And my poor Fantasme, still locked away in that odious asylum. She had met the arrow, she had Amunet. But is she really alive? Really free? If I can save myself, will I end up like her? But if I don't try, I'll end up like Angeline. How will I know which path is better when my time comes?

Either way, it feels to me like Angeline's threat is already happening to me; pretty pink ballet laces tightening around my throat.

Now I am in the basement of my home, still lost in the mist of my thoughts. With a hardwood floor and a large open space, it makes an almost ideal dance studio. The only differences are all the boxes stacked against the unpainted walls and the sofa I shoved out of the way years ago. Mom hardly comes down here so I never have to worry about her rearranging anything. And there aren't walls made of mirrors like in Madame Thibeault's torture chamber where you can watch yourself suffer and sweat. _Point your toes, jump higher, smile brighter_, _don't rush your motions_, I can hear her wicked voice hissing. There is only one mirror down here; one with an old, iron frame and gothic design. Probably my great-grandmother's or something. I line myself up in front of it, only seeing now how disheveled and sallow I look.

You'd think that after tonight, and knowing that opening night is tomorrow, I should be resting. I can't. I feel like if I rest, I'll never get back up again. I'll end up curling under my blankets and rotting 'til the worlds forgets me. But I suppose that's out of the question- although it does seem like a pretty good option right now. So I plug in the buds of my iPod and latch it onto my armband. _The Sands of Solipsism, Op. 14, Act I Adagio Suite For Seven Wives._

Even when I'm not under the hellacious eyes of my ballet instructors, it's practice, practice, practice. Yet still Solomon Muto's words linger. They swish between the laces of my pointe shoes as I tie them snuggly. They're in the bun pulling my hair that has become a rat's nest after a long day. I can't look at myself for too long in the mirror or I'll see them written there beside me. And what's more, a sour taste hangs in each breath, knowing what happened between Yugi and I. I can't quite say that we're back to normal or that we've made-up. Maybe we've both just come to an understanding; that whatever happened is something we both need to swallow. There's nothing we can do but hopefully move on with time. The only thing is, I don't know if I have time. I could be dead by this hour tomorrow.

Regardless, the heartbreak shows in my dancing. I can even feel it. Not a muscle moves without burning over how much I wish Yugi and I could just be us again. Maybe that's the whole reason why I even wanted to see him again; to just pretend like none of this ever happened. _Haha, l-o-l, j-k_, I'm not possessed by an evil Egyptian queen who wants to murder you. Of course not. I'd rather us be smitten in silence, just as friends who are too bashful to tell each other how we feel, than to finally have him for a moment and then die on stage. It wouldn't be fair to either of us.

_Born a person_. _Died a monster?_

Now as I piqué again, thoughts of Amunet tighten all my motions, make me dance more fierce and noble. What hate in her can compose a dance like this? Why is it that when I bring my hands into my chest and reach them out again it feels like I'm ripping my heart out? The motions of my stress and delusion become this cycle. Solomon. Yugi. Amunet. Fantasme. Repeat. Solomon. Yugi. Amunet. Fantasme. And again. Five, six, seven, eight. With all these horrors and swarming thoughts, it's hard to remember where I am in the dance. I won't let Amunet control my body, so I have to stay focused.

_C'mon, Tea! You know the movements. You've been practicing since you were a little girl, remember? Back in your room, before you were even ready for pointe shoes? Before you knew Angeline would have to die before you got the main role? Before you saw the frosted indifference screaming in Fantasme's eyes?_

I feel my body more heavily now. Perhaps it takes a little away from the perfection and grace of my lonesome performance, but it beats Amunet possessing my body again. I have more control over myself than I realized.

_Yes. Focus on the dance. I've memorized each part because it was my dream to dance this role. Focus, focus, focus, or else Amunet will have my body! The steps? What were the steps? _Fourth position. Open arms. Plié . Foot to passé. Close arms. Turn._ Born a monster. No, born a person. Met the arrow, then died a monster._ Fifth position. Spring up. Echappé sauté. Land in demi-plié. _But_ _the way he looked at me. Was that the work of a person or a monster? Yugi was hurt. it's my fault. I hurt him. I shouldn't have let Amunet have me. I wasn't strong enough. _Sur le cou-de-pied. Pas ballonné. Breathe, reach up. Glissade. Grande jeté_. _Land toe, ball, heel. _The next time he looks at me, it won't be one of those shy glances he'd sneak during geometry, or a blushing smile when I cheered him at tournaments. He'll be looking at a corpse in a coffin. He'll try to hold back the tears as he places flowers before me. Just like Angeline's parents did for her and her sister. They lost two daughters. I should apologize to them. Don't know what for, but I should at least offer my condolences. _

_Born a person. Died a monster. That's what Solomon said. _Large fifth position. Step into demi-plié on right foot. Second position. Turn en dedans. Thrust left leg en l'air. Complete the turn. _Can I really do this? The only one who has is Fantasme, and do I really want to be her? Maybe I did, but now? Guards, needles, no time to talk. The way she screamed when they pulled her down the hall. She's my burning ballerina. Meet Amunet at the edge of the stage as she had met the arrow. That's what Fantasme said. _Entrechant. Reach and relax. Fouetté en tourant. Faster. Faster. Faster. _Kill. Kill. Kill. _One-two down. One-two down.

I keep falling out of my turns. Nothing I do sticks right with the music and my body is burning up. It shouldn't be this hot. I shouldn't be this tired. It's been hardly any time at all. Amunet is writhing through me, wanting to own the dance in me. I can't let her! I have to focus! I lift onto my toes again and turn. Then I slip. So I try again. And slip again. Turn. Fail. I try to remember everything I was taught. Why aren't I spinning right? I'm snapping my movements. I'm whipping my head in the direction I'm turning. Yet I still stumble out of my first rotations. It's just one-two down. One-two down! Slip again.

I can almost imagine Angeline snickering with her pack of flat-chested, frail, snooty followers. They used to stand off to one side of the room when they were all finished showing off how perfect their techniques were. _Virtuoso_: Madame liked to title them. But while the rest of us were sweating, sore, and infuriated by our failures, they liked to pick out the weakest in the herd of us dancers in the room. As if they were about to attack the sick, the weak, and slow like hungry wolves. However, after the pack went up to the roof for a smoke, Angeline stayed behind and helped some of us out. I mean, in her rude, condescending way. So even as I fall out of my turns again and again, I can practically see her green eyes poking fun at me, and then her coming over to point out my mistakes. My first instinct would be to brush her off and resent her. But inside I'd know she was usually right.

"Don't rush the turn," I hear her say. "Bring your arm to your chest, don't leave it out too long."

Pretending she's here beside me is slightly comforting. I lift up again, doing as my imaginary Angeline says, and finally hit a decent pirouette. A rush breezes through me. Relief, exhilaration, and anxiety all at once cloud my veins and bound into my heart. For some reason, this feels like the greatest accomplishment in the word to me. It's a small victory at best considering that there are tons of them in _The Sands of Solipsism_. I've known how to do these since I was, like, thirteen. But now it feels better than ever. I could almost giggle with delight as Amunet had at Yami's touch. So I go again. Perfect. Again. Smooth. Pirouette after pirouette and everything seems to be working just fine. I can feel all my limbs, hear every heart beat, breathe every breath. This is me.

_Born a person, died a monster._

That's when the world stops. In mid-turn, I am met with horrifyingly black, unblinking eyes. A full body, hellish scowl and all, stands harsh and bleak against the grey plaster backdrop of my basement walls. Nothing escapes those eyes. They've slowed and distorted my own world so that the moment I spy her feels like an eternity. I somehow find them in my consternation, and regret ever locking eyes with hers. Those mendacious orbs should belong to a demon, not this girl with otherwise innocent features. It is like looking out your bedroom window at night, into the black unknown, and always wondering who might be staring back or what might pop out. And seeing her so unbelievably close to me- being able to gasp in a breath of her chilling presence- makes my brain just turn off. My body breaks beneath me. I simply stop, crashing into the mirror behind me.

The sound is loud. A cacophony of glass splinting in every which way, the iron frame toppling to the floor, my body landing amongst the broken bits of my reflection. A few of the larger pieces leave blood trails along my arm, especially at the elbows where my body lands heavily. One of those painful, aggravated growls tremor through my throat as I scream. Maybe more from shock than of actual pain. There's a whole amalgam of sharp emotions stabbing me. Frustration. Terror. Disdain. Foolishness. With the glass shards sending pain on its merry way through my arms, I break. I simply can't do this anymore. Everything erupts within me. I scavenge for the largest piece of the mirror I can grab in the split second my brain actually does something. It's out of my hands and exploding into the wall like a firework before I even knew what to do with it.

"What do you want from me?" I howl, though it's not entirely a question. There is no reply but the silence after a storm. Suddenly my breath is louder than ever, clouding over my ears like it was the only sound that ever was. It echoes from wall to wall, and I don't remember when I started breathing so hard. The dance wasn't even that strenuous yet. My body is trembling dangerously. I ache, shake, and quake like Amunet's victims had in their last bloody moments. I hate to think she's won, but the negativity bursting through me seems all too like a trophy to her. This spite growing inside me- the dread, the rage- I swear she gets off on this. And just thinking about how happy my frustration is making her shifts things from bad to worse. She's taunting me and I'm sick of it! I don't know how much more I can take until I-

_Until I am like Angeline. _I stop and think. _No_. _This is exactly the reaction she wants. She wants me to give in and fear her like Angeline and all the other dancers. She doesn't need to kill me when she can giggle and applaud as I kill myself. This must be how she tests the meat. Oh, Angeline… is that why you won't leave my mind today? Are you trying to warn an old rival?_

I grunt again, trying to avoid crunching on more glass as I stand. My pointe shoes are ripped at the sides with bits of the mirror wedged inside, just nicking my feet. As I reach down to pull the pieces out, I expect to see myself in a dazed shock, or even feel Amunet's hand around my neck. I don't. Instead, I see her in the reflection in some shady parallel universe. I stand tall, my feet echoing hers in the shards beneath my feet. I can almost feel them under me. I look down at her, and she looks down_- or up?_- at me. The ceiling above her is nothing like mine; it's rimmed with intricate designs and patterns, and squirming with shadows. Moonlight rains in on her. A simple smoke, probably incense, tangles around her. My reflection is her floor. Blood trickles down her arms. She had probably just killed. Some of it makes her dress blush. Then it plops down in great, heavy drops from the tips of her tiny fingers. They splash on her side of the mirror, right beside my feet. Drip. Drip. Splash. Splash.

Lost splatters hop onto my ankles and the pale pink of my shoes. That's when I realize that these blood drops are a two-way street. The cuts on my elbows are leaking the coagulating mush all down the sides of my arms too. Droplets fall from my fingers just like they do for hers. They then meet at the mirror parting our two worlds and bounce back in war. I am completely entranced, longing to know what other horrible fairytale she is trying to tell me. Amunet reaches for a piece of glass beneath our feet and lifts it into her upside down world. I can't decide whether I'm awake or asleep. It all seems like one big hallucination. But…

"Tea?" mom calls from above. "Tea, I'm home."

I shift all my attention towards the stairs. A shadow sifts over the top steps. Maybe mom walking upstairs. But why don't I hear footsteps? I try for words and yet nothing comes out. I want to yell, say that I'm down here, or at least know if I can get a reply back. I can't, though. My throat wants none of it- no voice, no breath. Everything catches and sticks, like the moment I'd clicked eyes with the killer. And speaking of! When I look back into the broken bits of mirror, I can't find Amunet's image in any of them. All that is left of her world is the dark palace ceiling, empty moonlight, and the incense puff that is now free to roam where her presence had prevented.

She's gone. The moment that thought fully sinks in, my heart dips. Why had she picked up that glass? Where did she go? Why'd she leave the second she heard my mom come in? If she touches her, I'll… I can't! Those thoughts won't even process in my head now. All that matters is getting to my mom before Amunet does. I push off the glass as hard as I can. Adrenaline has suddenly coated me in a strength I've so rarely felt before. My legs pump and hurdle up the stairs, take me around the corners of my house as fast as ever.

"Mom!" I call. "Mom, are you ok?"

There is no reply. Only my cat Kuriboh comes running. His little bell rattles in his hurry. I use my feet to kind of scoot him away in a gentle football motion.

"Go, Kuriboh. Go outside." I push him towards the cat door. It is said that cats are some of the most spiritual beings around. They can sense your emotions, lay with you when your feeling ill, even see spirits. And though Kuriboh remains simply a giant poof, he knows something's up. The cat hisses stubbornly. I want to say he's trying to hold me back from a fight, maybe even fight the battle for me. His arched back and glaring canines only prove more to me that Amunet is here and wants to _kill, kill, kill_.

"No." I say again to the cat. "Get out of here." He seems to understand, this wonderful child of Bast, and eventually toddles out the door in a haughty mood. I scour the kitchen for a weapon. I'll even take a pan if I can't find a knife. Not sure what either of these will do against a spirit, but having one with me makes me feel just that much safer. I lunge for a knife in the dish rack and wield it sturdily at my side. Now it's just matter of finding the one was born a person and died a monster. Finding Amunet, a shadow with a name, amongst the darkness.

"Mom?" I call again. My voice savors of fear. I cringe at every creaky floorboard, bite my lip at every thumping footstep. The staircase to the bedrooms is even worse. Even mounting the first step means wrestling between fight or flight impulses. It feels like the banister is shaking furiously beneath me until I realize that it's my hand that's still trembling. I ask again for mom, and when there is no reply again, I begin to fear the worst. I can see it in my head. I'm going to walk into mom's bedroom and find her mangled body scattered around the room. Her head on the nightstand, her arms dangling from the curtains. Or I'm going to have to follow a bloody trail and watch mom kill herself in the bathroom like Angeline did. I'm sure my screams will wake every tingle of pleasure in Amunet's being.

How I wish Yugi were here now. No matter the circumstance, no matter the enemy, he'd never give up. He'd be brave although his insides would be in total panic mode. Joey, too, would laugh away his worries. He and Tristan would charge into battle blindly if it meant saving those they love. Why can't I be more like them? Why can't I have the heart of Yugi? The strength of Joey and Tristan? The faith and passion of Pharaoh? Can I master all that Fantasme had? I may think I'm alone on this voyage into the darkness, but even now I can see their faces reassuring me in the back of my mind. They're telling me to go on, fight. They're telling me to be brave, to meet the arrow.

"Mom?" I try one last time, her bedroom door tapping the wall. My knuckles go white around the knife. It is so quiet that there's a wave of ringing noises in my ear. I hate that feeling; when you're in a closed, silent room, it suddenly feels like your ears are clogged and it's so quietly loud? Yeah. That's what entering this room is like. Through the wash of silent noise, a real ringing sound emerges. The ringing that pierced the ears of the ballet company when it scratched through the stereo. It's so high pitched and sharp, it's practically cutting my eardrums. I hear how the sound waves wiggle inside me. It's the sound of Amunet's presence and the ominous shrill of darkness to come.

I swing around hard, and start stabbing the air behind me. But she's already there, her hands conveniently snaked around my throat before I can plunge the knife down. One thundering growl later, and she's shoving me all the way across the room until our bodies slam against the wall. The chandelier above mom's bed writhes with the impulses of my head hitting hard against the sheetrock.

There's a real weight holding me down. There's a real clammy, meaty presence gripping my throat. Amunet is really here, really trying to kill me. I can reach out and touch her, like I do when I try to tug on her arms. Her skin is like wet clay, barely holding any shape over her limbs. But I can't deny the sheer power in her. Someone so brittle and dead like her has me locked against the walls and I can scarcely move. I fear her fingers may pierce my throat at any moment. Where does all her strength come from? It's like how Angeline held me against the lockers. Is that why she was so strong that day? Because she was possessed?

_I can't think about that now. I have to get out of her grip. _The knife in my hand hardly gets any where since I'm pinned, but I manage to bring it up to her elbow. She knows it's coming. I see her glance at it and yet she does nothing but tighten her grip. She lifts my head off the wall and thrusts it back again and again and again. My head pounds as she tries to crack it open. I croak in pain, my voice given a little more jolt every time my head lands back into the wall. I have to get out of this now. Now! With the best swing I can get, I slip the knife into her elbow. The feeling of it greeting the bone is horrible and still tingles in my fingers. I gag with what little breath I have. Of course, I'm not strong enough- or willful enough- to send it passing through her completely. But it's enough to loosen her hands. And the second she does, I burst with all my might and body slam her away from me.

She snarls. She's a predator whose just lost her prey and is now fueled by frustration. I don't get far in running away from her, though. I've only made it into the hallway when there's a hand around my ankle. She yanks me back and I fall onto my chest. Rug-burn seizes me for a moment until my body remembers there's a whole other pain to be feared. My hands reach for the stairway banister so that she can't pull me farther. But she does. She tries so hard to pull me that I can't hold on any longer. I end up rolling into her clutches where we wrestle for dominance. I am not the match for her that Yami was. I am like a doll she wants to see how far my head will stretch until it snaps off. But through it all, I try to look at everything but her eyes. I know that if I do, I will see my death in them. I will see how pathetically I struggle beneath her, the terror reflecting in my own eyes.

But then there is more. Amongst the blur of my tumbling, swatting, and punching, there is a new scent emerging in a cloud above us. A _real _haze! And I can smell it too; the smoke.

"Shit." I say between gritted teeth. I think it's the first time I've ever really cursed out loud. "Shit. Shit. Shit. _Shit_!"

Landing a kick that uses all my ballet muscles finally pays off. My foot sinks into her concave stomach. Mummification has left her without organs, so there's no gut to stop my foot from diving beneath her ribs. Her skin acts like an elastic band that holds her together, and it's the only thing keeping my kick from making a crater in her torso. She stumbles backwards, almost over the railing itself. I spring into my room where I know I'll find my cell phone on the bed. The smoke scratches at my eyes. I'm not surprised to find that my room is set almost completely alight. Flames chew up the curtains and devour my furniture. But I spy my phone in a tangle of bed sheets and hop over flames and the clothes I've been meaning to put away.

It's so hot. The fire then attacks my vanity, pecking at every photo and magazine cut out it can reach. I almost stumble into the flames on my way to my bed. And just as I'm about to slip the phone into my hands, Amunet is on me. She takes a wad of my hair between a fearsome grip and rips it out without mercy. The cruelest scream I have mixes with the roar of flames. The clump of brunette is tossed back into my face when she figures she has no real use for it. And then she knees me in the face, backs me up into a corner, and pushes my computer desk into me. Which even though I'm being pummeled to death in Amunet's tragic rage, I realize is what started the fire. A piece of the broken mirror wedged into a couple of the wires, and the outlet completely enflamed and melted.

I can't even scream anymore. I just moan and groan whenever another punch comes or she throws another bottle of perfume that so happens to graze me. Call me crazy, but I swear she doesn't mean to hurt me. Maybe shoving someone into a wall with a heavy desk is just her way of saying 'I need something'. I know. Ridiculous. But as much pain as I'm in, I can't help but notice how frantic she is and how it's not all towards me. This might be my way out. My only chance! She paces, prowling like a lion in the brush. My cell phone is still on the bed. If only I could reach it. It's so close and yet so far. And what if she sees me trying to grab for it? I have to try. My arm barely makes it, my fingers barely touch it. It's too far. Tears swell in my eyes. Is this really going to be how I die? How much longer until the flames pick up my scent? Until they swallow me whole?

I suppose it's a good thing that the fire burns so loudly. Otherwise, Amunet would hear how I sob like a baby. There's hardly any air for me to breathe between wails, but the moans and inaudible words keep coming anyways. I don't want her to see how death scares me. I don't want her to see the victory in me crying. But I can't stop. Won't stop. A little water will be good for these flames anyways.

There's a photograph on the floor. Only nipped by flames, I can still see the smiling faces of my friends. Joey. Tristan. Serenity. And my dear, dear Yugi. I'm in the middle, bunny-earring Joey and Yugi, and smiling like I haven't had in so long. I don't want to believe this is the end. But, the again, I didn't want to believe in the curse of _The Sands of Solipsism _either. Yet here I am. Flames closing in around me. My body pinned. The murderous Egyptian Queen's eyes sharper than ever in their black universe. I hear their voices even beyond the moment when the flames eat up photo. Their laughs, their goofing around, their inspirational speeches while one of dueled our way to victory.

I try one last time for the phone, pushing on the mattress to hopefully make it slide my way. The phone is heated already when it touches my hand.

"Yugi," my voice trembles.

"Tea? What's wrong?"

"Yugi, listen to me."

Amunet hears me. Her eyes snake my way before she turns whole body in my direction. She's disgusted that I even breathe. And with one cocked eyebrow and those menacing eyes, I know there isn't much time.

"What's all that noise? Tea?"

"Don't come to the ballet tomorrow." I croak.

"What?"

"She'll kill you."

And that's it. If I'm saved, I'm saved. There's nothing more I can do but have faith in my Yugi. He always knows what to do. And my eyes slowly, slowly succumb to the stinging of smoke. The last thing I see is Amunet between a blur of heavy lashes. She is staring. Just staring. Like she always has. Like she always will.

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><p><strong>One chapter left! O to the Siris!<strong>

**Update coming soon (or as soon as I think soon needs to be)**

**Haha. Thank you, pretties!**


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